Preamble

The House met at Eleven o'Clock

PRAYERS

[Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair]

Oral Answers to Questions — MIDWIVES

Mr. Storey: asked the Minister of Labour how many State certified midwives have been drafted into the Forces or directed to industry and are not now practising the work for which they have been specially trained.

The Minister of Labour (Mr. Ernest Bevin): No State certified midwives have been withdrawn from the practice of their profession and drafted compulsorily into the Services, or directed into industry. On the contrary, special steps have been taken, including the release of women with midwifery qualifications and experience from industrial nursing, to ensure that such women do, so far as practicable, make use of their special qualifications. In this connection I would refer my hon. Friend to the reply given him by my right hon. Friend, the Minister of Health on 14th December.

Mr. Storey: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that there is a very grave shortage of midwives in the North of England and that at least one maternity nursing home is likely to close down unless it can find the necessary staff?

Mr. Bain: I am well aware that there is a great shortage of nurses throughout the whole country, but I would ask my hon. Friend to appreciate that I cannot make good, in a war, the neglect of this profession for years before the war.

Oral Answers to Questions — NATIONAL WAR EFFORT

Directed Mineworkers

Mr. Lipson: asked the Minister of Labour on what dates since March, 1944, have ballots been taken for the direction

of youths to the mines; and how many have been so directed since that date.

Mr. Bevin: It would not be in the public interest to give information about the ballots for the selection of youths for underground coalmining. During the period 1st March, 1944, to 27th January, 1945, 18,794 men have been so directed, and of these 17,293 have actually entered training for coalmining.

Mr. Lipson: Can the Minister say whether his policy of directing boys to the mines remains unchanged?

Mr. Bevin: It will remain unchanged until the war with Germany is over.

Minework Volunteer (Direction to Army)

Wing-Commander Roland Robinson: asked the Minister of Labour whether his attention has been called to the case of Mr. E. R. Shenton, of 229, Dickson Road, Blackpool, who, in December, 1943, at the age of 17, having served in the A.T.C. for two years, volunteered for the R.A.F. and was passed for air-crew training, put on deferred service and later served as a clerk in the Ministry of Pensions; that in December, 1944, he was released from the R.A.F. and expressed his preference for work in the coal-mines; that preference was refused and he was directed to serve with the Army; and whether he will reverse this decision and make available a willing recruit for the coal-mining industry.

Mr. Bevin: The hon. and gallant Member wrote to my Department on 15th January about this matter and, as was explained in the reply, men who are on the Deferred Service List of the Royal Air Force are members of the Armed Forces and, as such, are not entitled to express an option for service in the coalmines.

Wing-Commander Robinson: Is the Minister aware that this case is typical of many others, and does he not think that the time has come to cut departmental red tape and make available voluntary labour for this form of National Service instead of forcing unwilling labour into the mines?

Mr. Bevin: This is very difficult to determine. Questions have been put to me from all parts of the House asking me to deal with it the other way. What I have tried to do is to keep strictly to the terms of the ballot.

Tuberculosis Sanatoria, Yorkshire (Staffing)

Mr. Spearman: asked the Minister of Labour if he is aware that tuberculosis sanatoria in Yorkshire have long waiting lists of patients whom they cannot accommodate owing to shortage of nursing and domestic staff; and can he take steps to help the local authorities to obtain adequate staff.

Mr. Bevin: I am making inquiry into the position in Yorkshire and will write to my hon. Friend.

DOMESTIC SERVICE

Mrs. Cazalet Keir: asked the Minister of Labour when the report of Miss Markham and Miss Hancock on the future proposals for domestic service will be published.

Mr. Bevin: There is little I can add at the moment to the reply given to my hon. Friend on 7th December, except to say that the consultations with my colleague which I mentioned are nearly completed.

Mrs. Keir: Can the right hon. Gentleman say when this report will be published? Is it not a fact that it was presented to him at the beginning of last summer?

Mr. Bevin: Yes, Sir, but it is a very involved question, and I have to consult all the Departments concerned. I hope to receive the inter-departmental report in a few days.

Sir Henry Morris-Jones: asked the Minister of Labour whether there is any increase now available in personnel to help in domestic households.

Mr. Bevin: The highest priority is given to the supply of domestic workers to households where the lack of domestic help is causing exceptional hardship. During the twelve months ended 3rd January, 1945, 18,715 vacancies were filled in households of this character.

Sir H. Morris-Jones: Can my right hon. Friend say whether he has any check on, or control of, the way in which women personnel are being used in the Services; is he aware that a lot of old people and invalids in households are constantly getting letters from their daughters saving

that they have nothing to do in the Services at all; is it not a fact that he has taken their sacrifice for granted all these years, and when does he expect to be able to make some amelioration in their situation?

Mr. Bevin: In answer to the last point, I shall be glad to be able to give amelioration immediately the war with Germany is over. I cannot answer for the Services, but as far as I am able to inform myself, there is no substantial waste going on at the present time.

Hon. Members: Oh!

Oral Answers to Questions — INDUSTRIAL RECONVERSION

Ex-Service Personnel (Business Grants Scheme)

Mr. Walter Edwards: asked the Minister of Labour if he is now in a position to announce details of the scheme to give financial aid to ex-servicemen and women who wish to restart in their own business or work on their own account.

Mr. Bevin: Yes, Sir. A scheme has now been prepared under which persons who have had full-time paid service in the Armed Forces and Auxiliary Services, the Merchant Navy or Civil Defence and were previously in business or work on their own account, will be eligible for a grant up to a maximum of £150 where this is necessary to supplement their own resources and enable them to restart. These grants will be available when releases from the Forces begin after the end of the war in Europe. In suitable cases, grants will also be made to assist persons disabled by war service to set up on their own account for the first time. I will, with permission, circulate a more detailed statement on the scheme in the OFFICIAL REPORT.

Mr. Shinwell: May I ask my right hon. Friend whether he will consider, in this matter, some form of protection for those men who wish to restart in business with limited capital, if they desire to purchase existing businesses at high cost? Can they be protected against the danger of being fleeced by people who sell fictitious businesses?

Mr. Bevin: I have established a committee, over which a former Lord Mayor of London, Sir Frank Newson-Smith, is presiding, to advise me, with the various


associations, chambers of commerce and others interested, on the setting-up of an advisory service throughout the country in order that people may be guided before they part with their money.

Dr. Edith Summerskill: In view of the fact that Service women and women in the Civil Defence Services are included, can the Minister say why women in the Women's Land Army are excluded?

Mr. Bevin: The Women's Land Army will be dealt with in another way. It is not a military force and will be dealt with by the Minister of Agriculture.

Mr. Driberg: While welcoming the inclusion of the Merchant Navy in this scheme, might I ask the right hon. Gentleman how it is that merchant seamen can be counted as ex-Servicemen for the purpose of this scheme, but not for the purpose of reinstatement in civil employment?

Mr. Bevin: That is quite a different subject.

Mr. Driberg: It is surely a parallel.

Following is the statement:

1. The scheme, which will be administered by the Ministry of Labour and National Service, is intended to come into operation after the end of the war in Europe when release from the Forces begins, in accordance with the plan already announced by the Government. The primary object is to assist men and women, who were in business or work on their own account before joining the Forces, Merchant Navy or Civil Defence Services, and can show that they need some help, additional to any war gratuities and post-war credits, in order to re-start their business or resume their previous occupation on their own account. The scheme is also intended, in suitable cases, to assist those disabled by war service to set up on their own for the first time. The scheme is, in no sense, one of compensation for losses incurred through the war, but is intended to supplement, within reasonable limits, the provision of war gratuities and other benefits.

Persons Eligible for Grant under the Scheme.

2. The scheme applies to men and women who have given full-time paid service in one of the following since 25th May, 1939:

H.M. Forces, and Women's Auxiliary Services,
Merchant Navy,
Civil Defence Services, including the National Fire Service and Auxiliary Police.

3. The scheme is primarily for those restarting. Those who are not disabled will be eligible for grants, only if they are restarting in a business of their own or are resuming their previous work on their own account.

4. Persons disabled by war service will be eligible for grants even if they have not previously been in business or work on their own account, provided that, having regard to all the circumstances, this would afford a better method of satisfactory resettlement than any other provided for the disabled. The degree of disablement necessary to qualify will be the same as that laid down under the Disabled Persons (Employment) Act, namely, that it entails a substantial handicap in obtaining or keeping employment which would otherwise be suitable.

5. Before a grant is made, applicants will have to show that they have obtained from the appropriate Government Department any licence or other similar permit that may be necessary; for entry or re-entry into the business or trade in question the obtaining of such a licence or permit, however, will not of itself entitle applicants to grants.

Amount of Grant.

6. The scheme is intended to give a reasonable amount of assistance to enable applicants to meet their initial expenses, where it can be shown that their own resources, including any war gratuities and post-war credits, are insufficient for the purpose. The cost of fitting up premises, obtaining equipment, tools, initial stocks, and similar items, may be such as to require some supplementation of the financial provision already made for those being released from the Armed Forces and other Services.

7. The maximum grant will be £150. Within this limit, the amount granted in any individual case will vary, according to the requirements of the business and the contribution which the applicant can reasonably be expected to make from his own capital resources. Applicants who have received payments in the form of war gratuities and postwar credits will be expected to contribute these, or to show good reason why they are unable to do so. Similarly, applicants who have disposed of businesses or equipment will be expected to include the proceeds in their contribution or to show good reason for not doing so. Account will be taken of other capital resources, but not of the regular payments made to Service personnel during the period of resettlement leave.

8. The scheme is for small enterprises, and is not intended to assist in the financing of projects requiring an initial outlay out of proportion to the maximum amount of grant.

Training.

9. As a general rule, persons will not be able to qualify for assistance under more than one of the various resettlement schemes. Those who have received training for employment under the Industrial Training Scheme, or have been assisted under the Further Education and Training Scheme, will not, therefore, normally be eligible for a grant, but special cases will be considered on their merits. Recipients of grants will, however, be able to take advantage of special short courses of training in simple book-keeping, buying and selling and allied subjects in cases where such courses are likely to be helpful. These courses will be provided free under arrangements made by the Ministry of Labour and National Service,


as part of their general plan of training in the resettlement period. Disabled persons who have received training under the Disabled Persons (Employment) Act will not be precluded from a grant under the present scheme. if they are otherwise eligible.

Type of Business.

10. While the scheme should be of assistance in relation to resettlement in the retail or similar trades, it will also apply to other small undertakings of a kind for which a grant would be appropriate having regard to the financial limits which have been laid down. Persons setting up on their own in a craft, including a rural craft, for which special equipment or a kit of tools is needed will be able to apply. In special cases assistance may also he given to persons restarting on their own in a profession.

11. The scheme will not apply to resettlement on the land of those who were working holdings on their own account before undertaking war service. This sort of resettlement will be dealt with under separate arrangements by the Agricultural Departments. The scheme will, however, apply in cases where persons are also eligible for loans from the local authority under the special arrangements relating to small traders in certain coastal towns. An applicant who is otherwise eligible for grant will not be debarred because he is also eligible for a loan from the local authority.

12. Grants will not be made to persons wishing to start or restart businesses outside Great Britain and Northern Ireland, but British subjects from other places may qualify for assistance to set up in Great Britain or Northern Ireland.

Disposal of Businesses assisted by Grant.

13. Recipients of grants will be required to undertake that they will not, within a stipulated period, dispose of a business or equipment, etc., obtained with the aid of the grant, except with the consent of the Ministry of Labour and National Service. Refund of the whole or part of the grant may be required from the proceeds of disposal.

Reinstated Ex-Servicemen (Redundancy).

Mr. Bowles: asked the Minister of Labour if he is aware that a man discharged from the forces and reinstated in industry tinder the Reinstatement in Industry Act for a period expiring in October, 1945, will be deprived of part of his statutory rights by reason of the factory in which he is employed being ordered to close in June, 1945; and what steps he proposes to take to preserve the rights of men who become redundant owing to the closing of war factories.

Mr. Bevin: I am not aware of the circumstances of the particular case which my hon. Friend has in mind, but it is possible that the man to whom he refers may have a right to continued employment by the same employer in another

factory, after his present place of employment is closed down. In any event, I trust that there will be no difficulty in finding suitable alternative employment for all workers who are displaced because the factories in which they are employed are unavoidably closed.

Mr. Bowles: If I send my right hon. Friend details of this case, will he look into it?

Mr. Bevin: Yes, Sir.

Oral Answers to Questions — LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE.

Mr. Tree: asked the Minister of Town and Country Planning, having regard to the interests of the public generally, and the Scott Report in particular, whether he is satisfied that there are sufficient specialists qualified by training and experience, to ensure that the subject of landscape treatment in the large number of development schemes now being formulated will be given proper consideration and that the work will be carried out under the best possible advice; and, if not, what steps he is prepared to take in order to assist trainees in the profession of landscape architecture.

The Minister of Town and Country Planning (Mr. W. S. Morrison): I recognise the value of expert landscape treatment in a variety of redevelopment and planning problems; and I shall do what I can to see that the best use is made of the knowledge and experience available. There is, however, at present a shortage of specialists in this subject, and the shortage is not likely to he made good until some time after the end of the war. I shall give every encouragement to the professional institutes concerned to arrange suitable courses of training.

Mr. Tree: Whilst thanking my right hon. Friend for his reply, may I ask if he is aware that there are no less than eight schools of landscape architecture in the United States and that landscape architecture plays a great part in all development schemes over there; and will he, therefore, try to get all the interested. bodies together, with the object of getting at least one Chair established at the earliest possible moment, in a British university?

Mr. Morrison: I am aware of the position in America as compared with this country, and I shall carefully consider the suggestion of my hon. Friend.

Oral Answers to Questions — DEAF PERSONS (TREATMENT)

Mr. Messer: asked the Minister of Pensions if there are any special rehabilitation centres in this country for the deaf and hard of hearing, similar to those known as Army Rehabilitation Centres for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing in the U.S.A.; whether there is any clinic, other than that at Manchester University, in which standardised tests are made of the capacity of ex-Service or civil deafened patients to benefit from different types of aids to hearing; and whether classes in lip-reading have been organised for deaf ex-Service personnel as they were in 1919.

The Minister of Pensions (Sir Walter Womersley): I am making inquiries as to the scope of the work done at the centres referred to. As regards the second part of the Question standardised tests are conducted by aural specialists at each of my regional offices to determine the most suitable type of aid to hearing appliance for ex-Service and civil deafened pensioners. In addition to the one at Manchester University, there are also special clinics at certain of the London hospitals, which are consulted in individual cases of difficulty. The reply to the last part of the Question is as indicated in the answer to a similar question by my hon. Friend on 2nd November.

Oral Answers to Questions — PENSIONS AND GRANTS

Mr. James Griffiths: asked the Minister of Pensions if he will give particulars showing how many applications he has received for pensions from parents of Servicemen who have died on Service; how many such pensions have been granted; and what is the highest and lowest amount of pension awarded.

Sir W. Womersley: Up to the end of last year rather more than 58,000 such applications had been received. Pension has been granted in some 25,000 cases and in addition title to pension has been admitted in 28,50o cases although no award of pension has been made because the parents were not in need at the time

of application. In these latter cases the parents have been informed that their applications may be renewed if their circumstances should worsen materially at a later date. The minimum rate awarded is 5s. a week and the maximum is 30s. a week for other ranks and £120 a year for officers.

Mr. J. Griffiths: Would my right hon. Friend publish a statement indicating the principles and scales upon which he decides the award of these pensions? Does he realise that we are continually being asked by our constituents why they are refused a pension, or on what scale it is, and we cannot reply?

Sir W. Womersley: I have already published that. In answer to a Question by the hon. Member for Deritend (Sir Smedley Crooke) in the latter part of last year, I published in the OFFICIAL REPORT a full statement, but I will repeat that if it is thought necessary.

Mr. Walter Edwards: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the 28,50o cases which he said just now are to be considered for entitlement—

Sir W. Womersley: Have been considered.

Mr. W. Edwards: —and are going to be granted entitlement should they require it in the future, are cases which ought to be getting it now, except for the fact that the basis of computing need is far too low?

Sir W. Womersley: I have said repeatedly in this House that I am quite prepared to hear arguments about the basis of need and to deal with them if it is shown to me that we are not dealing as generously as we might, but I have asked repeatedly for hon. Members to send me cases of hardship so that I can investigate. Not one has reached me, and I maintain that my scale is a correct one at the moment.

Mr. J. Griffiths: Will my right hon. Friend indicate whether in the reply which has already been published there is anything that will guide those who have been granted entitlement to pension as to when they are to apply?

Sir W. Womersley: The whole statement gives the details, and surely that will be an indication of when they can apply. The scale is set out as to how we arrive at need.

Mr. Tom Brown: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that there is, throughout the country, growing dissatisfaction at the attitude of his Ministry towards the subject of pensions, and would he not reconsider the decision already arrived at in order that these people may be given some satisfaction?

Sir W. Womersley: No, Sir, I am not aware of it. I know that in a certain part of the country there is a lot of agitation going on, and some hon. Members are supporting it. [HON MEMBERS: "Why not?"] I am only stating the fact; there is no harm in stating the fact, is there?

Mr. McGovern: And there is no harm in asking.

Sir W. Womersley: The decision is a Government decision, taken by the War Cabinet itself. I am carrying out that decision, and I am in thorough agreement with the decision arrived at by the Government.

Mr. Buchanan: The right hon. Gentleman said that no one has sent him cases. Is he aware that his Parliamentary Secretary is in the habit of dealing with these cases and that I have sent shoals of them on to him, showing how hardly people have been treated by his Department?

Sir W. Womersley: There has not been one case sent along that, on investigation, has proved to be one of hardship.

Mr. Buchanan: That is different. The right hon. Gentleman said that there was not a case sent to him. Now he is saying that, on investigation, hardship has not been proved. Members of Parliament are as capable of investigating cases as he is, and they have come to the conclusion that great hardship is being caused.

Sir W. Womersley: Unfortunately Members of Parliament have not access to the information that I have, and I repeat that I will deal with any case of hardship sent to me.

Oral Answers to Questions — INDIA

Ex-Service Personnel (War Gratuities)

Miss Ward: asked the Secretary of State for India the particulars of benefits to be given to men and women released from the Indian Forces on the cessation of hostilities.

The Secretary of State for India (Mr. Amery): In the case of British personnel the benefits will be on the general lines of those granted to the British Forces, but certain points of detail still require to be worked out owing to the differences between British and Indian pay systems, and I am not yet in a position to state the particulars. As regards Indian personnel the question is under active consideration by the Government of India.

Miss Ward: Could the right hon. Gentleman say when he thinks that his Department and the Government of India will be in a position to announce what is going to be done?

Mr. Amery: I am afraid I cannot give a precise date, but the matter is under consideration.

Detainees

Mr. Sorensen: asked the Secretary of State for India whether his attention has been drawn to the statement by the home member in the Legislative Assembly that under the Defence of India Rules, as on 1st January, 1945, 5,708 were imprisoned and 7,574 detained; and how he reconciles these figures with those last given by him as to the number detained.

Mr. Amery: I have, so far, received 710 confirmation of the report referred to by the hon. Member, and I do not know what was the request to which the reply was addressed. In replying to previous Questions in this House I have given the number of persons undergoing detention without trial in connection with the Congress movement. The number of such persons on the 1st December last, the latest date for which a figure has been reported to me, was 1,841. The balance is accounted for by some 2,000 persons detained in connection with serious outbreaks of criminal violence in Sind which were in no way connected with the Congress movement, and by persons detained in connection with terrorist activities.

Mr. Sorensen: Would the right hon. Gentleman communicate with the home member and the Government of India so that we might have a clearer picture of the various categories of persons?

Mr. Amery: I have attempted, whenever a Question is asked here, to give all the information available. When questions of a different character are asked in


the Indian Legislature, the member for the Government concerned answers those questions.

Mr. Sorensen: Would the right hon. Gentleman communicate with the Government of India to see exactly how these 2,000 people are made up?

Mr. Amery: Again, I must point out that, in these matters, law and order are within the responsibility of the Provincial Governments, and Provincial Governments act on their own when people are detained, just as the courts act on their own when people are convicted. Information of that sort eventually reaches the central Government, and I can always try to secure it in answer to specific questions.

Oral Answers to Questions — DOUBLE SUMMER TIME

Mr. Higgs: asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he is now in a position to make his promised announcement on the subject of double summer time.

The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Herbert Morrison): No, Sir, but, as I have already stated, I will make this announcement as soon as practicable.

Mr. Higgs: Is the Home Secretary aware that the objection to double summer time is not confined to agriculture, and that it is no benefit at all to industry, and will he bear that fact in mind when coming to any conclusion on that matter? Further, the Home Secretary promised this statement as long ago as the beginning of January; when is he going to give it to the House?

Mr. Speaker: The hon. Gentleman has asked when an announcement will be made. Now the hon. Gentleman is discussing the announcement in advance.

Oral Answers to Questions — SOUTH COAST (CAMPING RESTRICTIONS)

Mr. Keeling: asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department how soon he intends to remove the ban on camping within a mile of military establishments on the South Coast.

Mr. H. Morrison: The present restrictions upon camping to which my hon. Friend refers are operative throughout

the country but the number of military establishments to which they are applied has been greatly reduced as the result of a review undertaken by the Service Departments last September, at the time that the general prohibition on camping within 10 miles of the coast from Duncansby Head to Hingistbury Head was revoked. I hope it may be possible still further to reduce the number of establishments to which they are applied before the camping season begins, but it will probably be necessary to retain some restrictions until the- end of hostilities with Germany.

Oral Answers to Questions — ELECTORAL REGISTRATION (BUSINESS PREMISES VOTE)

Sir Harold Webbe: asked the Secretary, of State for the Home Department what steps have been taken to give publicity as to the procedure for lodging claims for inclusion in the May register in respect of the business premises qualification.

Mr. H. Morrison: Electoral registration officers and persons acting on their behalf have been instructed to publish in a newspaper, circulating in the constituency or area concerned, a notice setting out the procedure for making business premises applications, the closing date for receipt, which is 28th February, and stating from whom the forms required for this purpose are obtainable, and to whom they should be returned. They have also been directed to publish this notice in such other manner as they may think fit, when they consider this to be necessary—I understand that in fact posters have been issued in the constituencies primarily concerned.
In addition to this local publicity a Government announcement was issued to the Press and the B.B.C. indicating that the closing date for receipt of these applications was 28th February, that forms could be obtained on application from the town clerk of a Parliamentary borough, and the county clerk of a Parliamentary county, and that information would be available in the constituencies as to the detailed procedure for making these claims. I hope that this answer may give further publicity as to what should be done by those who wish to be included in the business register.

Sir H. Webbe: Is my right hon. Friend aware that in the Division I have the honour to represent there is, in fact, no effective local Press with a considerable circulation? In any further publicity which he is giving to this matter will he, in view of the fact that questions 4 (a) and 4 (b) on the application form will, in many cases, not be susceptible to an answer, explain what is required by question 4 (c).

Mr. Morrison: The last part of my hon. Friend's supplementary is too detailed for me to answer in response to a Parliamentary question. As regards his first point, I think the House will agree that I have taken all possible steps, in view of the fact that for the first time the business voter must claim, whereas before he was put on the register. My recollection is that in Westminster there are two or three newspapers circulating, which I rather thought were supporters of my hon. Friend.

Major Sir Jocelyn Lucas: Is it not a fact that newsprint restrictions stop newspapers from having their proper circulations?

Mr. Shinwell: There are too many Tory newspapers.

Mr. Woodburn: asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he has considered a circular, a copy of which has been sent him, issued by the London Municipal Society inviting the use of the franchise laws by directors and principal employees of companies to violate the spirit of the recent Act by artificial multiplications of the franchise by manufacturing leases of private lets within company premises; and what steps he is taking about it.

Mr. H. Morrison: I have considered the circular in question, which invites persons who are directors or in the employ of a company to enter into an occupational agreement with the company in order to secure the business premises vote. My opinion as to whether such agreements are a violation of the spirit of the law relating to the business vote would be of no value as my views on this matter are well known. As Home Secretary I can only consider whether they involve a breach of the law which calls for action. Not all the statements in the circular are accurate, but I am advised that in 1929,

in the case of Frost v. Caslon, the Court of Appeal decided that a tenancy derived from a genuine agreement entered into between a company and a director, in order to enable him to qualify for a business vote is effective for that purpose. The question whether any particular Agreement entered into is a genuine agreement is a matter for the registration officer to decide, subject to appeal, on the facts of each case. In the circumstances no action on my part is called for.

Mr. Woodburn: Is it not reprehensible that a body setting out to be the Government of a city should take part in a slick and somewhat shady incitement to misuse the franchise law?

Mr. Morrison: I can only say that, legally, the answer is as I have given, but having read the leaflet, I thought it was a little bit near the line.

Sir Herbert Williams: Is it not the case that a great many Members of Parliament get themselves put on the register in respect of the offices occupied by their associations?

Mr. Morrison: If they have done it by questionable methods, and my hon. Friend will let me know of any cases, I will look into the matter.

Sir H. Williams: Is it not just as legitimate for a business man to make a contract with a company as it is for a Member of Parliament to make a contract with his association whereby he becomes the tenant of certain rooms and gets a vote? What is the difference morally?

Oral Answers to Questions — ALIENS, GREAT BRITAIN (NATURALISATION)

Captain McEwen: asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he is aware of the number of Polish soldiers, especially those who have married in this country, who are anxious to obtain British nationality after the war; and whether he has in consideration any measure which will render this object more easy of achievement for them.

Mr. H. Morrison: Among the many foreigners who are assisting the war effort of the United Nations, both in the Armed Forces and in civilian occupations, there are numerous people who are anxious to obtain British nationality, and I know of


no ground on which I should be justified in selecting for preferential treatment the particular group to which my hon. and gallant Friend refers.

Captain McEwen: In view of the fact that such applications as this are likely to increase in future, is this not a matter to which the Minister might well give his immediate attention?

Mr. Morrison: At the appropriate time general policy on this matter should receive attention, but I think it would be premature to determine it at the present moment.

Mr. Graham White: Is my right hon. Friend aware that there is very understandable anxiety among the people referred to as to what their position will be at the end of the war? Will he make such an announcement as may be possible as soon as possible?

Mr. Morrison: There is some anxiety in other quarters as well, including British, and I must take all points of view into account.

Miss Rathbone: Is the Home Secretary-aware that we are about the only people who treat in this way men serving in our Armed Forces? Whereas men in the Forces of the U.S. and in the Dominions are almost automatically naturalised we treat these people as of no importance.

Mr. Morrison: The circumstances in other countries are different. My hon. Friend will persist in thinking that the British nation have treated refugees badly, and, with great respect, I think she is entirely wrong.

Mr. McGovern: Is the Minister aware that this country is under a special obligation to these men, many of whom will not want to return to a Stalinised Poland? In view of the gross betrayal of Poland at the present moment, should not these people get special treatment?

Mr. Morrison: The views of my hon. Friend on foreign affairs generally, and on this matter, will be given due consideration.

Oral Answers to Questions — SIR WALTER CITRINE (VISIT TO GREECE)

Captain Duncan: asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department on what conditions Sir Walter Citrine was granted an exit permit to visit Greece.

Mr. H. Morrison: It is not the general practice to attach conditions to the grant of exit permits, and no conditions were attached in this case.

Captain Duncan: In cases like this where an important delegation makes a visit abroad, and there is likely to be an important report, will the Minister, in future, consider attaching a condition to the permit that a copy of the report should be submitted to him, so that Members of Parliament can receive copies? At present, it is impossible officially to obtain a copy of Sir Walter Citrine's report.

Mr. Morrison: I will consider that. It would however, be very unusual, and would possibly elevate delegations into a rather too official position. But if my hon. and gallant Friend applies to the Trades Union Congress, I am sure that they will consider whether they can supply him with a copy of the report.

Commander Sir Archibald Southby: Is it in order for Members of Parliament, other than those sitting on the other side of the House, to apply to Transport House for a copy?

Mr. Morrison: Yes, Sir, I should think so.

Oral Answers to Questions — LOCAL AUTHORITY MEMBERS (RELEASE FROM FORCES)

Mr. Salt: asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department if, in preparation for the municipal elections which are to take place in November next, he is prepared to take steps to secure the temporary release of men in the Services who are councillors due to retire to enable them to seek re-election.

Mr. H. Morrison: I understand that this matter, which obviously presents substantial difficulties, is under consideration by the Service Departments, but I am not at present in a position to make any statement.

Mr. Salt: If it is impossible for councillors to return to fight an election, may they retain their seats without re-election?

Mr. Morrison: Under the Representation of the People Bill, now reaching its last stages, their qualification to stand again is preserved, but I do not think I could preserve their actual membership of the council if they were otherwise required to stand for election.

Mr. Guy: Will the Government give serious consideration to this question, as representatives of local government bodies are just as important as other representatives?

Mr. Morrison: They are much more numerous, which makes the problem more difficult. I said that the Service Departments are considering it, but I do not want the House to feel too optimistic about it.

Oral Answers to Questions — CHILDREN'S HOMES

Sir Ralph Glyn: asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether the terms of reference of the Committee that he has appointed to consider the care of children will include an investigation into the terms and conditions under which various charities, some of considerable antiquity, take charge of orphans and other children who are without homes, in view of the altered conditions and the trend of recent legislation and the restrictions imposed on the operation of charities and trusts by the Charity Commissioners.

Mr. H. Morrison: I understand that the Minister of Education, as the Charity Commissioner in respect of educational trusts, has power under the Charitable Trusts Act to remove out-of-date or other restrictions imposed by an original trust which may now hamper the working of the charity. The terms of reference of the proposed committee would not exclude them from considering cases where an alteration of a trust appeared to be desirable for the purpose of enabling homeless children to be brought up under better conditions; but I am anxious that the committee, who will have a big task, shall concentrate their attention on large questions affecting the welfare of children.

Sir R. Glyn: Does the right hon. Gentleman realise that large numbers of children are put out in homes through the medium of these organisations, some of which are very good and others not so good?

Mr. Morrison: That will certainly be kept in mind.

Oral Answers to Questions — EVACUATED CHILDREN, WALLASEY (TREATMENT)

Mr. Touche: asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he is aware that when Mr. and Mrs. Baldock

complained to the police at Wallasey regarding the case of cruelty to their children the police refused to take any action in this matter and that the subsequent prosecution was only brought through the action of the N.S.P.C.C.; and whether he has any statement to make on the subject.

Mr. H. Morrison: Mr. and Mrs. Baldock were seen by the coroner's officer on 27th November and a statement was taken from Mrs. Baldock. This statement made no suggestion of cruelty or ill-treatment to the children, and my information is quite definite that no such suggestion was made at any time during the interview with the coroner's officer. I am informed that no intimation of any alleged ill-treatment to the children was made to the coroner's officer or to any other member of the Wallasey police force until 18th December, when the local inspector of the N.S.P.C.C. saw the coroner's officer and told him that he was investigating a complaint of ill-treatment of Peter Baldock.

Mr. Touche: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that when Mr. and Mrs. Baldock went to the police at Wallasey and made the complaint, they were told that no action could be taken, and is it not the fact that the case would never have been heard of, apart from the action of the N.S.P.C.C.? Is this not entirely unsatisfactory?

Mr. Morrison: The hon. Member is making a direct allegation against the police, which the police deny. I am informed, after the most careful inquiry, by the police that the statement that the complaint or allegation was made at that time is untrue and, unless there is real evidence to the contrary to prove it otherwise, I must accept the statement of the police.

Mr. Silverman: When the N.S.P.C.C. officer told the coroner's officer that he was investigating the complaint, did he say from whom the complaint had emanated?

Mr. Morrison: I could not say.

Mr. Edmund Harvey: Has the right hon. Gentleman considered a letter, a copy of which I sent him, from Mr. Baldock stating that he had applied to the police and asked them to visit the child in hospital and that this had not been done?

Mr. Morrison: I have seen such a letter but that allegation by Mr. Baldock is definitely disputed, and I do not feel that


I can accept it as necessarily being true. Of course, recollections may be at fault, and the circumstances with which the father and mother were faced were very distressing and worrying.

Captain Cobb: Was the death certificate given by the police surgeon, and not by the doctor who attended the child?

Mr. Morrison: I believe the doctor who attended the child only attended—I am speaking from memory—after the child was dead, and he declined to give a certificate, which is quite ordinary. The coroner referred the matter to the police surgeon, who could find no traces of cruelty, and certified death from natural causes, and I am quite sure that he genuinely so certified.

Mr. Touche: asked the Minister of Health (1) if he is aware that when Mrs. Baldock, of Hanworth Road, Redhill, applied in July that her children should be sent to a Government residential nursery she received a letter from his Ministry stating this could not be granted because Reigate was not an evacuation area and that when she wrote pointing out this mistake she received no reply; and will he make inquiries into this matter;
(2) if he has made inquiries into the circumstances in which Mr. and Mrs. Budd, of Wallasey, were recommended by the welfare officer as suitable persons to have charge of small children; and why no welfare officer ever called at Mr. Budd's house while evacuated children were there.

Mr. Willink: I think the House would wish to have the full facts of this distressing case. They cannot be given shortly, and I am therefore circulating a complete statement in the OFFICIAL REPORT.

Following is the statement:

Mrs. Baldock's first letter gave her address as "Salfords, Redhill," and the map consulted showed Salfords to be outside the evacuation area. The letter asked for information about the residential nurseries established under the Government Evacuation Scheme and said that Mrs. Baldock wanted to evacuate her two boys, both of whom were under five, outside the official scheme as she was unable to go with them. The accommodation available in Government residential nur-

series is limited and has always been reserved for children under five who, for one reason or another, are without adequate parental care. Even, therefore, if it had been clear from the start that Mrs. Baldock was living in an evacuation area it would not have been possible to find places for her children in one of these residential nurseries. Mrs. Baldock's second letter did not reach my Department until 16th August and, owing to the extreme pressure of evacuation work at that time, was not dealt with until eight days later. One of my officers then spoke to the Reigate borough council offices and was told that arrangements had been made through the welfare officer at Reigate for the two children to be taken to Wallasey. I regret that Mrs. Baldock was not sent a further reply but the assumption that none was necessary because the welfare officer would have already explained the position fully to Mrs. Baldock was not, I think, an unreasonable one. The welfare officer comes from Wallasey and she had received Mr. and Mrs. Budd's offer to take the two children through friends in Wallasey. The Budds live in a very respectable residential neighbourhood and were highly spoken of; they are prominent members of a local church and Mrs. Budd was known to the welfare officer to be a State registered children's nurse. The Budds seemed therefore to be particularly well qualified to act as foster parents.

The welfare officer discussed their offer with Mr. and Mrs. Baldock and made arrangements for both of them to go with their children to the Budd's home in Wallasey, in order that they might decide whether to leave the children there or not. This they did, their fares being paid, Mr. Baldock's through a voluntary agency. They stayed a few hours with the Budds, and left the children there, being apparently as satisfied as those who had suggested the arrangement had been that the children would be well cared for. Although the official scheme assists such private arrangements with free travel facilities and billeting allowances, the responsibility for them rests on the parties concerned. When Mrs. Budd applied in Wallasey for a billeting notice, her home was visited by a representative of the Wallasey billeting officer and found to be satisfactory. If the procedure laid down had been faithfully followed the children might later have been visited by a child protection


visitor. But Wallasey had not, until last July, been a reception area
and the billeting staff was both heavily pressed and unaccustomed to the procedure for notifying all billeted children under five to the medical officer of health. Had this notification been made, it would have been possible to arrange for the home to be visited, but it will be appreciated that, in the present shortage of man-power, I cannot guarantee how soon or often a visit would have been paid. Apart from this omission to notify the case I think that all concerned in evacuation did their best for Mr. and Mrs. Baldock and their children and the very regrettable outcome was such as no one could have foreseen.

Oral Answers to Questions — EDUCATION

Secondary Schools (Admission)

Mr. Lipson: asked the Minister of Education if the admission of pupils to aided or maintained secondary schools is to continue to be determined by examination after fees are abolished on 1st April; and, if so, when does he propose to substitute some other test than an examination at the age of 11 to decide a child's fitness to be admitted to a secondary school.

The Minister of Education (Mr. Butler): In carrying out their duties under Section 8 (1) of the Education Act, 1944, I anticipate that local education authorities will take steps, as soon as circumstances permit, to replace the present system of selection on the basis of competitive examination by suitable tests designed to determine the child's abilities and aptitudes, based on school records and reports and other available data, full regard being had to the wishes of the parents as provided in Section 76 of the Act.

Mr. Lipson: Does that answer mean that this is a matter within the discretion of local education authorities and, if so, is my right hon. Friend drawing their attention to the desirability of adopting the new method?

Mr. Butler: I have said that I anticipate that local education authorities will take this course. No doubt, they will notice my answer and we shall be able to work together, as we have done in other matters.

Dairy Industry (Training)

Sir William Davison: asked the Minister of Education what steps are being taken to improve the present methods of training men and women desiring to enter the dairy industry; and whether he recognises the urgent need for additional workers with university degrees in the industry.

Mr. Butler: The question of the best form of training for entrants to the dairying industry is receiving the attention of the departments concerned, and I can assure my hon. Friend that, when the needs of the industry have been ascertained, we shall do our best to see that suitable provision is made for the training of all types of entrant.

Sir W. Davison: What university course is there suitable for giving the scientific instruction required?

Mr. Butler: I must have notice of that Question.

Mr. Rhys Davies: In view of the fact that large numbers of dairy workers are members of trade unions, is anything going to be done to ensure that those trade unions will be consulted on this surggestion?

Mr. Butler: Trade unions have always shown themselves very keen on education.

Nursery Schools

Mr. Kenneth Lindsay: asked the Minister of Education whether he is aware of the closing down of war-time nurseries in many places; and what steps are being taken to retain the staff pending the fuller development of nursery schools and classes under the control of local education authorities.

Mr. Butler: Yes, Sir, I am aware that some war-time nurseries have been closed, and that further closures may be expected. I hope that in many cases, where the site and premises are suitable, these nurseries will be transferred to the local education authorities as nursery schools, or possibly as nursery classes, and that the appropriate members of the staff will go with them.

Mr. Lindsay: The right hon. Gentleman says he hopes many of these people will receive training; is he aware that some have already gone into clerical work?


Could there not be some continuity between their previous work and their training?

Mr. Butler: I have made inquiries and my information is not quite similar to that of the hon. Member. In many cases redundant staff are employed in filling vacancies in continuing war-time and residential nurseries. But I will certainly watch the position.

Mr. Lindsay: asked the Minister of Education what provision he has made for the training of nursery school teachers in emergency centres, in order to prepare for the expansion of nursery schools as foreshadowed in the Education Act.

Mr. Butler: Courses will be provided under the Emergency Teacher Training Scheme preparing students for work in nursery as well as in other schools. Two colleges will be opened within the next two or three months which will include provision for such courses, and further provision will be made as and when women can be released from essential war work in order to train for teaching.

Mr. Lindsay: Could not a number of these young women who have been engaged in war nurseries go to training centres immediately? Is it not a question, not of getting fresh people but of retraining those who have had three months' courses?

Mr. Butler: The number of war nurseries that have been closed is only a few since last September. I do not know that there would be enough to fill a training course.

Evacuated Schools (Return)

Major York: asked the Minister of Health whether he will give an undertaking that in future when his Ministry decides to move evacuated schools from the North of England to the South, his officers will take the advice of his local advisers as to the advisability of the move; that the decisions to move are not made mainly on financial considerations and that transport facilities are properly organised.

The Minister of Health (Mr. Willink): My hon. and gallant Friend may rest assured that no residential school would be brought back to its permanent premises unless my advisers, both in the reception area and in the former evacuation

area, were satisfied that the move could take place without risk to the health and welfare of the children. I am writing to my hon. and gallant Friend on the particular case he has brought to my notice.

Major York: Will my right hon. and learned Friend make sure that in any future case financial considerations will not be the predominant motive?

Mr. Willink: Certainly.

Oral Answers to Questions — HOUSING

Temporary Hutments

Lieut.-Colonel Dower: asked the Minister of Health under what powers local authorities are requisitioning bombed sites for the erection of huts; and whether he is aware that as a consequence claimants may be prejudiced in respect of their rights under the War Damage Act.

Mr. Willink: The powers are derived from Defence Regulation 51. The answer to the last part of the question is "No, Sir."

Lieut.-Colonel Dower: Is my right hon. and learned Friend aware that the replacing of modern buildings under cost of works payment might be indefinitely delayed? Will he consult his right hon. Friend who is concerned, and the War Damage Commission?

Mr. Willink: The policy with regard to this requisitioning has been decided after close consultation with my right hon. Friend and the Chairman of the War Damage Commission. Requisitioning is to take place only where the destroyed premises do not attract cost of works payment.

Repaired Houses (Tenancies)

Lieut.-Colonel Dower: asked the Minister of Health whether, in view of the fact that war-damage repairs can now only be carried out by local authorities, he will ensure that before local authorities nominate tenants for such repaired houses the owners or leaseholders will be given a fair opportunity to re-occupy them or let them.

Mr. Willink: Local authorities have no power to nominate tenants unless the houses belong to them or have been duly requisitioned by them. The question does not, therefore, normally arise.

Day Nurseries (Continuance)

Mr. McNeil: asked the Minister of Health if he is aware that his decision to dose day nurseries has caused deep disappointment to many working-class mothers and has evoked protests from a number of local authorities; that nursery schools are not a substitute for nurseries as their function is different; that the postwar housing situation will make these nurseries an essential service; and is he prepared to receive representations on the subject.

Mr. Willink: As my hon. Friend is aware, that war-time nurseries have been provided at the cost of the Exchequer as an aid to war production. They have been provided as a war service under emergency powers and those powers cannot be used to provide a normal welfare service such as I understand my hon. Friend to have in mind.

Mr. McNeil: Does not the right hon. and learned Gentleman agree that, if the Department was concerned to continue them, he could find ways and means of doing it?

Mr. Willink: I do not consider that it would be right, or indeed possible, in the years immediately ahead to develop a new welfare service on these lines.

Sir Percy Harris: Is it not a pity to let this experience and organisation peter out and come to nothing?

Mr. Willink: I am quite sure that the experience will not be wasted, I am in close consultation with the Minister of Education, who will be making arrangements for the care of a large number of children in war-time nurseries.

Dr. Edith Summerskill: In view of the fact that the Minister of Labour has indicated that as many women workers as possible will be needed after the war, how does the right hon. and learned Gentleman propose to provide for the care of the small children?

Mr. Willink: The position is that wartime nurseries are closed only in special cases, and they are not being closed rapidly.

Mr. McNeil: I give notice that I shall raise this matter on the Adjournment.

Colliery House (Doncaster Area)

Mr. Evelyn Walkden: asked the Minister of Health if he is aware that numerous miners and their families, tenants of colliery houses, in Adwick and Bentley have been, and others are being, ejected in consequence of their employment at the collieries being terminated; and as there is neither alternative accommodation nor available vacant houses in the Doncaster area, whether he will arrange with the Government Departments concerned to convert the new but unoccupied and unused Bentley No. 2 miners' hostel into temporary living accommodation for many of these families.

Mr. Willink: I am making inquiries and will let my hon. Friend know the result.

Mr. Walkden: While the right hon. and learned Gentleman is making those inquiries, will he pay particular regard to the fact that many of these dishoused persons are ex-Service men who are unfit for the mines, and, owing to the mine-owners wanting the houses, have no homes to go to?

Mr. Willink: Yes, Sir.

Emergency Houses

Mr. Bossom: asked the Minister of Health if he has yet made a time and progress schedule of the dates at which it will be possible to deliver the Government's emergency houses to the various local authorities so that he can inform those authorities of the date by which they must have their roads, sewers and foundations ready to enable the Government to erect the houses immediately they are available.

Mr. Willink: Delivery of temporary houses will be largely determined by the order in which sites are handed over to the Ministry of Works ready for the construction of foundations, local authorities were informed of this arrangement in a circular dated 12th February, of which I will send my hon. Friend a copy.

Mr. Bossom: Has my right hon. and learned Friend made a time and progress schedule of people who have said that they have sites ready, so that there may be some comprehensive understanding of the entire situation?

Mr. Willink: I am not sure what would be included in the rather extensive field


covered by a time and progress schedule, but I can assure my hon. Friend that the Minister of Works and I are in constant and close consultation and collaboration in the respective functions which his Ministry and the local authorities discharge.

Mr. Bossom: We cannot get a comprehensive observation of labour and material unless we know what we are going to do. Unless it is properly tabulated we cannot get that information.

Old People (Bungalows)

Mr. Rhys Davies: asked the Minister of Health whether consideration has been given in post-war house-building plans for the erection of small bungalows to which aged couples may remove and leave their larger dwellings in which they now reside for occupation by families; and if so, with what result.

Mr. Willink: Yes, Sir. Advice to local authorities on this subject is included in Housing Manual, 1944.

Oral Answers to Questions — OLD AGE PENSIONS

Mr. Tinker: asked the Minister of Health what is the estimated total cost of supplementary pensions under the old age and widows' pensions for the year ending March, 1945; how many are in receipt of them; what is the average amount for each person; and how much of it comes under the heading of rent allowance.

Mr. Willink: The estimated cost of supplementary pensions for the year ending 31st March, 1945, is £57,000,000. At the end of December, 1944, there were approximately 1,387,000 supplementary pension cases current which covered the needs of 1,616,000 old age and widow pensioners. The average payment per case was 16s., and the average amount included in this figure for rent or the reasonable share of rent in cases where the applicant was not the householder was 6s. 5d.

Oral Answers to Questions — PUBLIC HEALTH

Refuse Collection (London)

Sir W. Davison: asked the Minister of Health whether he is aware of the serious delays occurring throughout the London boroughs in the collection of dust by reason of shortage of staff, making in

many cases collections only possible at fortnightly or even three weeks' intervals, whereby dust has often to be dumped on the roadway; and will immediate arrangements be made for the release of suitable labour to enable these conditions, which are a danger to the health of the community, to be dealt with.

Mr. Willink: I would refer my hon. Friend to the reply which I gave to my hon. Friend the Member for North Lambeth (Mr. G. Strauss) on 8th February.

Sir W. Davison: Does my right hon. and learned Friend realise that in many flats there is no room for the storage of dust for two or three weeks and that tenants are compelled by force of circumstances to remove it and dump it in the highway? Is not this a matter of great urgency?

Mr. Willink: I am fully aware of the seriousness of the position. Indeed, in the answer to which I have referred I described the situation as acute. I am doing my best about it.

Mr. G. Strauss: Is the right hon. and learned Gentleman aware of the divergence of practice, that in some boroughs they remove refuse more quickly than in others, and that some places are particularly bad?

National Health Insurance (Malaria)

Mr. Sorensen: asked the Minister of Health whether, under his regulations, discharged soldiers in civilian life can claim National Health Insurance benefit for sickness that could be attributed to malaria suffered during their military service.

Mr. Willink: The answer is "Yes, Sir," subject to the normal statutory conditions for title to benefit being satisfied.

Tuberculosis Sanatoria

Mr. Sorensen: asked the Minister of Health approximately how many beds arc now available for tuberculosis patients; and how many such patients are awaiting admission to sanatoria.

Mr. Willink: The latest returns available show the number of beds provided by local authorities in England and Wales for tuberculosis as approximately 29,000, and the number of patients on waiting lists for institutional treatment as approximately 4,500.

Mr. Sorensen: In view of that very distressing position, could the right hon. and learned Gentleman indicate what steps he has taken and is taking to meet it?

Mr. Willink: We are taking constant steps to meet the difficulty, and have done so over the last few years. In spite of the destruction of many beds and much accommodation, the accommodation is practically the same as before the war. We are taking further steps, and there may be a possibility of using further sections in the emergency hospital service.

Mr. Messer: Is the right hon. and learned Gentleman aware that Middlesex County Council is now compelled to refuse further admissions to Harefield Sanatorium, and that the situation is serious?

Mr. Willink: I entirely agree that the situation is serious. The major difficulty is not so much accommodation as staff in this field, as in many others where the strain is great.

Mr. Tom Brown: What are the steps which the Department is taking?

Mr. Willink: It would not be possible, particularly in reply to a supplementary question, to describe all the things that have been done in the direction of getting medical staff, nursing staff, domestic staff and accommodation to meet this difficulty.

Mr. Sorensen: Is the Minister consulting the Minister of Labour with a view to securing more staff?

Mr. Willink: I am surprised that such a question should be asked. Of course, I have consulted the Minister of Labour.

Oral Answers to Questions — GENERAL FRANCO (PRIME MINISTER'S LETTER)

Mr. Martin: asked the Prime Minister how it has come about that the substance of his letter to General Franco, the terms of which were denied to Parliament, has been published in the U.S.A.; whether this was with the consent and approval of His Majesty's Government; if not, what action has been taken in the matter; and what further action it is proposed to take in the future to prevent the continuance of episodes injurious to the authority and prestige of Parliament.

The Deputy Prime Minister (Mr. Attlee): It is the case that reports have

been published in the United States newspapers purporting to give the substance of the Prime Minister's recent correspondence with General Franco. This publication took place without the prior knowledge, and still less the consent, of His Majesty's Government, and inquiries are being made in order if possible to ascertain how the leakage occurred. While there was nothing in the Prime Minister's reply which His Majesty's Government would wish to conceal, it is, as I informed the hon. Member for North Lambeth (Mr. G. Strauss) on 31st January, contrary to the established practice for the texts of communications of this nature between Governments to be published, and it is clearly likely to give rise to misunderstandings if unauthorised leakages of this kind take place. His Majesty's Government were not responsible for what happened in this case, and as regards the suture they can be counted on to do what lies within their power to prevent unauthorised leakages of information.

Sir A. Southby: In view of the fact that in this case a serious leakage has taken place, is it not desirable that Members of the House should be fully informed about this correspondence?

Mr. Attlee: I think it would be undesirable to set a precedent by publishing this correspondence.

Earl Winterton: As this is not the first occasion on which documents sent to the United States Government have been published in an unauthorised way, will His Majesty's Government make a strong protest to the United States Government with the request that this practice should cease in future?

Mr. Attlee: We are doing our utmost to find-out how these leakages occur, and we have taken the matter up.

Mr. Edgar Granville: When the Deputy Prime Minister refers to the substance, does that mean that the whole of this letter was published in the United States? Is he aware that only part of the letter has been published in this country, and will he see, if the whole of the letter was published in America, that it is published in the Press of this country?

Mr. Attlee: I have already said that it is not the intention of His Majesty's Government to publish the letter.

Mr. A. Bevan: Is it not a fact that there is another side to this story, that newspapers in his country, almost immediately after the despatch of this letter, contained a statement purporting to give what was the general tendency of the letter, and that it is suspected that this emanated from His Majesty's Government's public relations officers in order to undo the mischief which the Prime Minister's reference to Franco had created?

Mr. Attlee: I have no information about that.

Mr. McGovern: Will the right hon. Gentleman bear in mind the Prime Minister's own views in regard to ending secret diplomacy and reconsider publishing these documents?

Mr. Buchanan: As certain documents have been published and the public know certain facts would it not be better for all concerned, including Members of Parliament, if the Government now published all the facts?

Mr. Attlee: My hon. Friend is now putting again the same question that has been put, and my reply must be that it is undesirable to create a precedent by publishing correspondence of this nature.

Oral Answers to Questions — EX-SERVICE PERSONNEL (WAR GRATUITIES)

Mr. Tinker: asked the Prime Minister when this House will be given an opportunity of discussing the Government's policy on war gratuities; and will he consider giving that opportunity on a discussion of the Notice of Motion on the Order Paper on that matter standing in the name of the hon. Member for Leigh and other hon. Members.

[That in the opinion of this House, the scheme for war gratuities outlined by the Chancellor of the Exchequer on 6th February, should be amended so as to make one uniform rate according to length of service applicable to all ranks, whether men or women.]

Mr. Attlee: As indicated by my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer on 6th February, the Government are quite willing that there should be a discussion of this matter, if that is the general desire of the House. The question is one for arrangement through the usual channels.

Mr. Tinker: Can the Deputy Prime Minister say whether it will be possible to provide an opportunity some time next week for the opinion of the House to be taken, and will the Government regard as binding what has been said?

Mr. Attlee: I am to be asked a Question a little later about the Business for next week.

Mr. De la Bère: asked the Prime Minister whether, in view of the low rate of pension of the regular members of the Services, having regard to the recent pronouncement on gratuities to the temporary members of the Services, he will instruct the First Lord of the Admiralty, the Secretary of State for War and the Secretary of State for Air to look into this matter and to make such recommendations as they consider necessary.

Mr. Attlee: There is no connection between the rates of pension and the recently announced gratuities which are payable to both regular and temporary members of the Services.

Mr. De la Bère: Is not the Deputy Prime Minister aware that it might be necessary to review, and indeed to augment, the pensions of the regular Armed Forces of the Crown after the war, in view of the change in world living conditions?

Oral Answers to Questions — ATLANTIC CHARTER

Mr. Rhys Davies: asked the Prime Minister whether, in view of his declarations as to which countries the provisions of the Atlantic Charter do not apply. he will now state to which countries those provisions do apply.

Mr. Attlee: I think my hon. Friend is under a misapprehension. My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has been at pains to make it clear in past statements in the House that the Charter cannot be regarded as applying as a matter of right to our enemies, or as constituting any sort of pact or bargain with them.

Mr. Rhys Davies: Does not the right hon. Gentleman understand that people are being deceived by statements made by the Prime Minister on this subject? The Prime Minister told us some time ago that the Charter does not apply to certain countries. Why cannot the Government,


therefore, tell us to what countries the provisions of the Charter do actually apply?

Mr. Sorensen: Why was the particular interpretation now given by the Deputy Prime Minister not made perfectly clear at the time of the signing of the Charter?

Mr. Attlee: I think it was perfectly obvious at the time the Charter was made that it was a statement giving the general principles on which the United Nations were acting. There never was any suggestion that it was a bargain with our enemies.

Sir H. Williams: Does it apply to the Baltic Republics of Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia?

Hon. Members: Answer.

Mr. De la Bère: And answer came there none.

Oral Answers to Questions — FAMILY ALLOWANCES

Mr. Edgar Granville: asked the. Prime Minister if he can now say when it is intended to introduce the necessary legislation to implement the policy of the Government on family allowances.

Mr. Attlee: The Family Allowances Bill was presented yesterday and copies are available to-day.

Mr. Granville: Is it the intention of the Government to pass this legislation through all its stages in the present Session of Parliament?

Oral Answers to Questions — AGRICULTURE

Bee Diseases

Mr. E. P. Smith: asked the Minister of Agriculture whether any Regulations have been made by his Department for dealing with bee colonies infested with foul brood and Isle of Wight disease; and what methods obtain of enforcing such Regulations.

The Minister of Agriculture (Mr. R. S. Hudson): The Foul Brood Disease of Bees Order, 1942, empowers county war agricultural executive committees in England and Wales to take action to deal with colonies of bees infested with foul brood disease. No Regulations have been made in the case of Isle of Wight Disease.

Mr. Smith: Will my right hon. Friend consider establishing a national register

and making these diseases compulsorily notifiable, as well as providing compensation where colonies have had to be destroyed?

Ploughed-up Grassland (Re-seeding)

Mr. De Chair: asked the Minister of Agriculture what assistance the Government are now giving, or intend to give, to farmers in the re-seeding of grassland which has been ploughed up as part of the war-time policy of expanding the arable acreage.

Mr. Hudson: As the answer is somewhat technical and long I will, with my hon. Friend's permission, circulate it in the OFFICIAL REPORT.

Following is the answer:

No Exchequer assistance is payable in respect of the re-seeding of grassland ploughed up during the war. Owners of agricultural land will, however, be entitled to lodge claims for compensation for the ploughing up of permanent pasture at the end of the war in accordance with the terms of a memorandum issued in December, 1939, a copy of which I am sending to my hon. Friend. Occupiers of agricultural land are absolved by Section 15 of the Agriculture (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act, 1943, from any liability under their tenancy agreements, or otherwise, in respect of permanent pasture ploughed up under emergency powers; good returns have, in general, been received from the crops grown on such land; and tenants are entitled, on quitting their holdings, to compensation in respect of temporary pasture in accordance with the terms of the Agricultural Holdings Act, 1923.

Long-term Policy

Mr. Edgar Granville: asked the Minister of Agriculture if he has now received replies from the National Union of Agricultural Workers, the National Farmers' Union and the other representative agricultural bodies whom he has consulted on a long-term policy.

Mr. Hudson: I am unable at present to add to previous statements on the subject of long-term policy.

Mr. Granville: Can the Minister give an assurance that the Government will produce their long-term policy on agriculture before the General Election?

Oral Answers to Questions — RURAL AREAS, WALES (WATER AND ELECTRICITY SUPPLIES)

Sir Henry Morris-Jones: asked the Minister of Agriculture what steps he is now taking to ensure that farms in rural Wales will have a supply of main water and electricity; and whether he can state, approximately, how soon after the war they may expect to have these urgent requirements.

Mr. Hudson: The extension of water supplies to rural areas in Wales will be facilitated by the Rural Water Supply and Sewerage Act, 1944, and, as my hon. Friend will be aware, further legislation on this matter is now before the House. The extended use of electricity on farm premises generally is under review in connection with post-war agricultural policy, and favourable consideration is given, notwithstanding present restrictions, to the authorisation of electricity supplies to farms where a substantial increase in food production or saving in man-power is likely to result. I am not in a position to give any indication of the date when these extended water and electricity supplies are likely to become operative.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

Mr. Arthur Greenwood: May I ask the Deputy Prime Minister whether he can state the Business for next week?

The Deputy Prime Minister (Mr. Attlee): The Business for next week will be as follows:

Tuesday, 20th February—Report and Third Reading of the Local Authorities Loans Bill; Committee and Third Reading of the Northern Ireland (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill and India (Estate Duty) Bill [Lords]. Afterwards, there will be an opportunity, on the Motion for the Adjournment of the House, for a Debate on teachers' salaries.

Wednesday, 21st February—Second Reading of the Water Bill and Committee stage of the necessary Money Resolution.

Thursday, 22nd February—Second Reading of the Law Reform (Contributory Negligence) Bill [Lords]; Committee and remaining stages of the Road Transport Lighting (Cycles) Bill [Lords]. And, if there is time, Report and Third Reading of the Licensing Planning (Temporary Provisions) Bill.

Friday, 23rd February—Second Reading of the Ministry of Fuel and Power Bill and Committee stage of the necessary Money Resolution; further progress with the Colonial Development and Welfare Bill, if not already disposed of; Motions to approve the Government of India (Family Pension Funds) (Amendment) Order and (Governor's Allowances and Privileges) (Amendment) Order.

Mr. Greenwood: If it becomes desirable to change the Business for next week, will notice be given at the earliest possible moment, for the convenience of Members?

Mr. Attlee: Yes, Sir, certainly. If there should be an occasion for a statement or a Debate, the earliest opportunity will be taken to give notice.

Mr. Erskine-Hill: Is the Deputy Prime Minister aware that the Ministry of Fuel and Power Bill, which is put down for Second Reading next week, was introduced only this week and, in view of the fact that, prima facie, it contains some wide issues, of which some might be controversial, will he delay the Second Reading of the Bill to a later time?

Mr. Attlee: I suggest to my hon. and learned Friend that this Bill is purely a machinery Bill—El-lox. MEMBERS: "No."] if hon. Members will look at it they will see that it is so—for continuing the Ministry of Fuel and Power. It does not deal with the transference of powers of any sort. The present war-time powers will lapse, of course, at the end of the war. I should have thought that the principle of bringing together, under one Ministry, these various functions which were formerly separated, was a fairly simple one, and that the Bill is uncomplicated, and I should have thought, therefore, a week was sufficient time for hon. Members to deal with its Second Reading.

Colonel Sir Arthur Evans: In view of the fact that the President of the United States has asked Congress to ratify the Bretton Woods Agreement and that the necessary Bills are being introduced in both Houses of Congress to-day, might I ask the Deputy Prime Minister when this House will have an opportunity of dealing with the matter?

Mr. Attlee: I was not under the impression that the procedure was quite so rapid


as my hon. and gallant Friend has suggested; but, certainly, as I have said, the House will be given an opportunity.

Earl Winterton: In view of the conditional or contingent promise which the right hon. Gentleman gave in reply to the question whether we could have a Debate on the all-important matter of the economic condition of Western Europe—rather more important than some of the Bills which have been referred to—would he give very favourable consideration to providing that opportunity for Debate on an early day in the following week?

Mr. Attlee: As I informed my noble Friend, we will give a day. I will consult him and other hon. Members to see which is the most convenient time to take it, and how best we can do it.

Mr. Tinker: Has the Deputy Prime Minister now given consideration to the point of my question to him about war gratuities? He said he was going to make a statement on Business; can he now tell us something definite?

Mr. Attlee: I have said that I will certainly give it consideration. Then my hon. Friend asked me if it would be considered next week. I have stated the Business for next week, and that subject is not included. We will give consideration to an early date, but I cannot say that it will be next week.

Sir A. Southby: Reverting to the matter raised by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for North Edinburgh (Mr. Erskine-Hill), will the right hon. Gentleman reconsider taking the Ministry of Fuel and Power Bill on Friday, in view of the fact that it is impossible to suspend the Rule on that day? The Deputy Prime Minister appears to take the view that the Bill is a mere triviality, but it is a Bill which will have very far reaching results. Will he bear in mind that the Government are now turning out Bills like sausages out of a machine, and that it is utterly impossible for either Members of Parliament or the public to digest them?

Mr. Attlee: I do not agree with my hon. and gallant Friend in his general observation with regard to sausage machines, and so forth. If he will look at the Bill, I think he will see that there is ample time, before Friday of next week, to enable Members to deal with the general prin-

ciples on the Second Reading of this Bill. There is, of course, a possibility of putting down Amendments which may be Committee points, but the general principle of the Bill is really a simple one.

Miss Rathbone: In view of the importance of the Family Allowances Bill, and as many controversial points are likely to arise on it, can the right hon. Gentleman give us some idea when the Second Reading is likely to be taken, and how soon after that the Committee stage will be?

Mr. Attlee: The hon. Lady will realise that, as my hon. and gallant Friend has said, it is necessary to give hon. Members ample time to study Bills, and this is a more complicated and difficult Bill. Therefore we do not intend to rush it on the House, before Members have had time to consider it.

Sir H, Williams: Having regard to the proceedings on the Lighting (Cycles) Bill last week, does not the right hon. Gentleman think it desirable that we should deal with the Committee stage of the Law Reform (Contributory Negligence) Bill before we further consider the Lighting (Cycles) Bill?

Mr. Attlee: I should doubt it. We can see how it goes. I should have thought that by the time we reached the Second Reading of that Bill, we should have managed to connect it with the points that arise on the Lighting (Cycles) Bill. I will endeavour to meet hon. Members as much as possible, but I do not think there should be any difficulty.

Mr. Higgs: Can the right hon. Gentleman inform the House when he expects to introduce the Bill dealing with the location of industry?

Mr. Attlee: Not at present. It will not he next week.

Mr. Gallacher: Can the right hon. Gentleman. tell us when the Education (Scotland) Bill will be brought forward, and when we shall get the Second Reading? We were promised it in a month, and the month has nearly passed, but there is no mention of a date for it yet. There is a very serious neglect of Scottish affairs.

Mr. Attlee: That Bill is fairly well advanced, and will be introduced pretty shortly.

Wing-Commander James: Reverting to the Ministry of Fuel and Power Bill, will the Deputy Prime Minister realise the difficulty in which the House is placed? We are faced with a demand for the Second Reading, at short notice, of a highly controversial Bill, and are told we can amend it in the Committee stage, but once a Bill is given a Second Reading it is very difficult for us to controvert—

Mr. Speaker: That would be a very good argument to put during a Second Reading Debate.

Mr. McNeil: In regard to the matter raised by the hon. Member for West Fife (Mr. Gallacher), may I ask my right hon. Friend to be more definite, as five weeks ago I was given an almost similar answer by the Leader of the House?

Mr. Attlee: I cannot be more definite. These Bills take time to draft. I cannot confine myself to a day or two; that is quite impossible.

Captain Duncan: Will the right hon. Gentleman give the House an assurance that the Committee stage of the Requisitioned Land and War Works Bill will be put off until local authorities have had time to study this Bill, with the Chancellor of the Exchequer's Amendments, which we hope to see on the Order Paper, and to give them time for the necessary consultations?

Mr. Attlee: I will endeavour to give adequate time, but, as I say, I cannot confine myself to a day or two.

Mr. Snadden: Can the right hon. Gentleman say whether time will be given to discuss the Motion relating to the imposition of double summer time?

[That in the opinion of this House the imposition of double summer time is detrimental to vital food production and other national interests and it is therefore desirable that this measure should not be reimposed upon the country this summer.]

FORESTRY POLICY (DEPART MENTAL RESPONSIBILITY)

The Chancellor of the Exchequer (Sir John Anderson): With your permission, Mr. Speaker, and by leave of the House I should like to make a short statement on forestry.
It will be necessary for the country to adopt after the war a larger and more comprehensive forestry policy. The Government have, therefore, reviewed the present machinery, with a view to securing more complete and more direct Ministerial and Parliamentary control, the better co-ordination of the development of agriculture and forestry, and the most efficient use of the woodlands which survive the war and of further land available for afforestation. They have come to the conclusion, after prolonged consideration of various possible alternatives, that these objects can best be secured by enlarging the sphere of the Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries and the Secretary of State for Scotland, so that these Ministers may become jointly responsible for forestry policy and for supervising the measures for its execution. Under such an arrangement the Forestry Commission will be retained as a single continuing expert body, responsible directly to Ministers for advice on forestry policy and for carrying out operations, including training, research and forest holding. The Commission will, as at present, be appointed by the Crown.
Legislation will be necessary, and a Bill now in draft will be brought before this House as soon as time permits. In the changed circumstances it will, as I think the House will agree, be no longer appropriate that Members of this House shall be members of the Forestry Commission. This will, I am sorry to say, necessarily mean the end of an arrangement to which the House and the country had become accustomed and around which a pleasant tradition had been built up. Questions on forestry will, of course, in the future, when the new arrangements have come into operation, have to be answered in the usual way from the Front Bench.

Sir George Courthope: May I thank my right hon. Friend for his statement, and for the kind words he has used about my colleagues and myself? May I ask him whether he will be able shortly to give us the measure of the expansion which will be authorised so that the essential preparation may be made for that expansion, such as the recruitment and training of officers who will be necessary for dealing, not only with the State forests, but even more so, with the privately owned woodlands?

Sir J. Anderson: Yes, Sir. I hope it will be possible to make such a statement in the very near future. It has really been waiting until this question of machinery was settled.

Mr. J. J. Lawson: Can the Chancellor tell us when the House will have an opportunity of hearing what this statement he has made to-day really means, as many of us have been very suspicious about the general attitude of the Government towards afforestation in this country?

Sir J. Anderson: I think a very convenient opportunity will arise on the Second Reading of the Bill, which, as I have said, will be introduced at an early date.

Earl Winterton: Will this Bill merely transfer these functions to the Ministry of Agriculture, or will it include the expansion of powers which many of us of all parties have urged, so that the Ministry should have the same power of control, through the Commission, over the way in which private woodlands are managed, as the county war agricultural committees have over agricultural land?

Sir J. Anderson: I am in a little difficulty on that point, though I appreciate its importance. The Bill will be concerned primarily with machinery. Whether it will be found Convenient to include in the Bill certain further provisions for the development of forestry policy in general and in particular, in relation to the control of private woodlands, has not yet been finally determined. In any case it will have to be dealt with by the House at a very early date.

Mr. Tinker: Is the Chancellor of the Exchequer aware that the public are much disturbed by trees being cut down on forest land and left lying there? Could not we first of all try to clear up those sites?

Sir J. Anderson: I think a question like that had better be put on the Paper.

Mr. De Chair: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that his answer will give general satisfaction in the country, although the House naturally respects the services which have been given by the Forestry Commission?

Mr. Buchanan: We learn from the Chancellor of the Exchequer that the

Minister of Agriculture and the Secretary of State for Scotland will answer questions. In view of these new arrangements, could I ask him to impress upon the Ministers the need for answering questions so that we can follow them?

NAVY (SUPPLEMENTARY ESTIMATE, 1944)

Estimate presented, of the further Sum required to be voted for the Navy for the year ending on 31st March, 1945 [by Command]; referred to the Committee of Supply, and to be printed. [No. 40.]

NAVY ESTIMATES, 1945

Estimates presented, for the Navy for the financial year 1945 [by Command]; referred to the Committee of Supply, and to be printed [No. 41.]

LOCAL GOVERNMENT WHITE PAPER (RECONSTRUCTION)

12.17 p.m.

The Minister of Health (Mr. Willink): I beg to move,
That this House welcomes the intention of the Government to preserve the existing framework of the county and county borough system of local government and the proposals for the establishment of a Local Government Boundary Commission outlined in the White Paper presented to Parliament.
Even in these years of war, when so large a part of our Parliamentary time has necessarily to be spent on the war itself and on measures directly related to its prosecution at home and overseas, there have been a number of occasions when matters concerned with local government have been discussed. Some of these—the Education Act of last year is perhaps the best example—have concerned legislation of first-class importance. There have also been, as hon. and right hon. Members will recall, three Agricultural Acts, and in the Debates leading up to those Acts and in relation to town and country planning, the National Health Service and the Government's employment policy, we have discussed from time to time the proper distribution of responsibility as between central and local government and the adequacy of our local government system to fulfil its very great tasks. On all these occasions, however, it has been a particular aspect of local government that we have considered, and I believe that it is timely and not unwelcome that an opportunity should have arisen for a general survey such as is given by the White Paper referred to in the Motion before the House.
We are now at a stage when reconstruction is, we may confidently say, about to become actual. The time is not far distant when White Papers and plans will require to be translated into action. The local authorities are already laying the foundations of their post-war services, and it is right that we should consider by what legislative and administrative action Parliament may give them the greatest encouragement and help.
I would stress that this Motion is essentially concerned with local government in the years immediately ahead. It refers to a White Paper whose title is "Local Government in England and Wales during the Period of Reconstruction," and I would emphasise that it is not intended by the

first part of the Motion to invite more than an acceptance of the view expressed in the Paper itself that it is inexpedient to contemplate drastic innovations, such as the constitution of regional bodies, in reshaping the local government system to fit post-war needs. The Government are united in this view so far as the period immediately ahead of us is concerned and I doubt whether to look beyond that period is really profitable at the moment.
It was right, I think, to wait before making this general survey until Parliament had approved the great measure for the reform of our educational system; but we are further helped by the fact that legislation dealing with such a subject as rural water supply and sewerage has now been passed and that the House has considered and approved in principle the Government's proposals in relation to the Health Services, for example, and with regard to the transfer of a substantial section of public assistance functions from the local authorities to the Assistance Board. All these matters guided us in our approach to the general question.
But, as I have said, it is now time to face the general issue. Our local democratic institutions have a long and fine tradition—with achievements for which many give them too little credit. They are undertaking, as I believe, greater responsibilities than ever before. To what extent and how best can Parliament contribute to their vigour and efficiency in these years of reconstruction?
I have a personal reason to know and to be very grateful for the close attention that has been given by very many hon. Members, and many outside, to the White Paper. It has been in the hands of the House and the public since very early in the New Year, and I shall not attempt to go through it in any detail or attempt to summarise everything that is in it. What I should like to do is to outline the considerations which have combined to suggest the proposals which the White Paper contains, because they are quite numerous.
First I should like to mention the series of schemes, very diverse in character, some of them very far-reaching, which were issued by the local government associations. These have, of course, all been most carefully considered, but I doubt whether the associations will really complain if I say that perhaps the most


striking characteristic of these schemes was their diversity. The second matter to which I should like to refer is what I think can be described as the general atmosphere of apprehension and suspicion that undoubtedly prevailed for a long time in local government circles. I have more than once been reminded of the Walrus and the Carpenter. The local authorities were as suspicious as the Eldest Oyster; the Government as suspect as the Walrus.
O Oysters, come and walk with us!
The Walrus did beseech,
A pleasant walk, a pleasant talk,
Along the briny beach.
The eldest oyster looked at him,
But never a word he said:
The eldest Oyster winked his eye,
And shook his heavy head—
Meaning to say he did not choose
To leave the oyster-bed.
The Government have no such sinister intentions.
Next, there were apparently serious fears that the system of Regional Commissioners, which has been of such great value during the war, was to be continued. I think that bogy is now finally laid. There were also fears that plans were afoot for large, new, elective regional authorities. That fear too, I think, has gone; though of course it is true, and we must face the fact, that in several of the services there is undoubtedly need for planning over areas wider than those of individual local authorities.
Then, with greater reason, there has been anxiety that the reconstruction programme will place an impossible burden on local rates. As to this I shall have something to say before I sit down.
If I turn to the particular anxieties of various types of local authorities—and this is not a mere question of vested interests or parochialism of outlook—I would say, as to the counties, that there is a very genuine anxiety that by gradual erosion, by the creation of new county boroughs and the extension of existing county borough boundaries, their administration may be fatally handicapped. To the counties, as applications for county borough status and the extension of county boroughs become imminent, I am not sure that the county boroughs are not the Walrus:
Now, if you're ready, Oysters dear,
We can begin to feed.
That is certainly the impression I have

obtained from a number of letters with regard to certain proposals that have already been put forward. But the county boroughs too, and the larger non-county boroughs, are gravely concerned about the adequacy of their areas if they are to achieve their planning ideals. The minor authorities fear progressive loss of responsibility, and therefore of local interest, a fear which is all the stronger because the more experienced among their number realise that there are still very many minor authorities which, on any fair view, are too small and too weak financially to bear the responsibilities which are placed upon them.
But let me leave the apprehensions and the anxieties and make a more positive approach. I would say that we ought to have three main objectives in considering this matter. In the last resort local government will stand or fall by those whom it can attract to its service, whether as members or officers. This cannot be exaggerated. We all know that during the war the supply of public spirit on the Home Front as well as in the Forces has been inexhaustible. I am sure that many who have served in the Armed Forces, including the Home Guard, in Civil Defence, in W.V.S., and in many other organisations, have turned their minds to the possibility of becoming members of their local councils.
I think that the discussion groups, both at home and abroad, in the Forces and outside the Forces, have been an important factor in strengthening and increasing this healthy attitude. I hope that the younger generation will come forward, and that a reasonable proportion of younger men and women will be accepted by those who have influence in the choice of candidates and by the electorate.
I would say too that, in my judgment, local government provides a field in which women can give outstanding service. Very much of the work of local authorities concerns matters in which women have more natural interest, and often more expert knowledge, than men. This is certainly the case with large sections of the health services; it is certainly the case with housing and maternity and child welfare; and not least with a subject which has attracted the attention of Members of this House in recent weeks and months. the care of children who have no normal


home life. I hope that women, who have played such a distinguished part during the war, will carry on and offer themselves for election to the local councils.
The Government have been glad to see, from recent announcements in the Press, that a number of important commercial and industrial concerns have also got this matter in mind. They have made it known that they wish actively to encourage members of their staffs to serve on local government bodies and will give every facility for attendance at meetings without loss of pay. If we are to attract to local government work those whom we want to see engaging in it, I cannot help feeling that, both centrally and locally, there is need to make more widely known the scope, the importance, and, therefore, the human interest of the work with which our local authorities are concerned. There is need, certainly in many parts of the country, although there are exceptions, for more publicity to create a better and more widely-spread knowledge of the responsibilities that local authorities have and the way they are discharging them.
A high standard of local government officers is no less important. The House may recall that in 1934 there was a strong Departmental Committee, over which the late Sir Henry Hadow presided, which issued a report recommending, among other things, the establishment of a regular system of local government staffing, including the appointment of a central advisory committee and of local establishment committees. Work on this subject, which had begun before the outbreak of the war, was inevitably suspended, but I think it should now be made known that a body with a long name, the National Joint Council for Local Authorities' Administrative, Professional, Technical, and Clerical Services, which was reconstituted at the beginning of last year in a more representative form, but which has, or at any rate embodies, 25 years in Whitley Council work, is now taking the matter up and has under consideration a number of proposals affecting the recruitment, qualifications, training, and promotion of local government officers.
I referred to three main objectives that were in my mind. The second positive objective that I would mention is that local authorities should be assured of a greater measure of stability than is the

case at present. The principle of a 10 years' interval between changes of area was accepted in the Local Government Act, 1929. But that applies only in the sphere of that Act: it does not operate so far as Parliamentary Bills are concerned. I believe that it is of real importance to enable local authorities to make long-term plans with reasonable certainty that they will be able to carry them out without the disturbance which is caused by alterations of their areas at uncertain dates and times.
The third, and pressing, necessity is that we should encourage, and do nothing to discourage, vigorous and confident work throughout the local authority field during this period upon which we are entering. How can the housing authorities reasonably be expected to press on with urgent plans for housing or the rural district councils with equally urgent plans for new and improved water supplies if county districts, as such, feel themselves to be in peril of extinction? The same argument applies to the negotiations which are now going on in connection with the National Health Service. These discussions necessarily assume, and can only proceed on the assumption, that the main structure of local government as it now exists will still be in existence when the National Health Service comes into operation. But perhaps the strongest argument of all may be founded on the Education Act. Could our education services possibly develop as we hope they will in the next few years if the whole future of county and county borough government were in the melting pot? I cannot think that that would be possible.
It is upon a review of all these factors that the White Paper and this Motion are based. It is upon that review that the suggestion of a Local Government Boundary Commission is made. If we are to achieve the objectives that I have mentioned, our aim must be to reform out organisation, but without disruptive change. I think it is fair to say that the proposal to establish a Boundary Commission was received well by the experienced people with whom I discussed it last September, and, although I know there are some who would like at an early date to go further, I think that even they have approved the proposal in itself, and that it has during the six weeks since the White Paper was published met with pretty general approval.
I need not describe to-day the faults which it is designed to remedy. They are set out in the White Paper, which describes the difficulties that arise from the piecemeal way in which local government areas come to be altered, and in which they will again be altered in future unless there is some machinery which will combine the procedure by Parliamentary Bill and the procedure by county review. There are obvious disadvantages in a system under which there is no correlation, or practically no correlation, between the action of Parliament in dealing with major changes concerning the status and boundaries of the county and county borough councils and the action of county councils and the Minister of Health with regard to the status and boundaries of county districts within the counties. I believe, and the Government believe, that those difficulties will become serious unless action is taken. And it is not only an immediate question: I believe that the work of a Commission of this kind would be not only of immediate, but of increasing, value.
The Commissioners would, of course, be most carefully chosen from persons of experience and weight in both public and local government affairs. I do not think they should be selected to represent the interests of any particular type of local authorities, and perhaps it is worth mentioning that when the proposal was discussed with leading representatives of the local government Associations in September, they unanimously expressed the view that the Associations should not be consulted in the selection of the Commissioners.
A particular point which is of importance in the immediate post-war situation is the suggestion that the Minister should be empowered to give the Commissioners directions as to the order in which they should proceed with their reviews. Such a direction would enable the Minister to discharge the undertakings that were given when the special needs of the blitzed cities and towns were discussed, at the time of the town and country planning debates.
Parliament will be specially concerned, I apprehend, to see that in a matter of this importance there are proper constitutional safeguards as to the action of a body of Commissioners, and I should like to say a word about those safeguards. There are two sorts of safeguard sug

gested in the White Paper. The first is that the Commissioners should be bound to act in accordance with general directions laid before Parliament and approved by affirmative Resolution. The second is that, with regard to what I may call major adjustments of areas, boundaries and status, the Commissioners' decisions should be subject to review by Parliament. I think that, with regard to general directions, it would he misleading to suggest that it would be either desirable or, indeed, possible to frame them so precisely as not to leave the Commissioners with a large measure of quasi-judicial discretion. All the same, I believe that the Government could lay down certain broad principles applicable in the case of local authorities of all types and that these general directions could indicate the sort of requirements as regards size, financial resources and so on, which ought prima facie to be met if a satisfactory unit of local government is to be established. This, of course, is a subject which I would wish to discuss with the local government Associations before framing and laying before Parliament directions on such an important matter.

Mr. T. J. Brooks: Do I understand that the Minister is prepared to go to the local authorities with the general directions before they come before Parliament?

Mr. Willink: I should like to discuss the proposals informally with the local government associations, as is so frequently done in these local government matters, in order to obtain the views of people of experience. No bargains would be made, of course.
There are two particular questions with which the general directions would deal. The first is the minimum limit of population for an application for county borough status. I think it may well be, when one considers the enormously increased range of local government services, that some change should be considered. I hardly need remind the House that from 1888 to 1926 the limit was 50,000 and that in 1926 it became 75,000. If I may assume acceptance of the principle that there should be some minimum limit, views may differ on what the figure should be, but I think few to-day would put it below 100,000. Whatever figure may be adopted as the number of population which would entitle


a town to apply for county borough status, I think it would be wise to make it quite clear in the directions that this figure represented a right to have the case considered but not a right to the status. Indeed, one might provide that in the case of applicant boroughs whose populations did not reach a rather higher figure, such as 125,000, the burden would be upon them to show that the case was exceptional.
There is another question which is raised in the White Paper in connection with the general directions—the question of linking town and country areas within the administrative country. I think it true to say that conditions have changed a great deal since the principle was stated, just over 100 years ago, that such a union was inappropriate. In my own view, great respect should be paid to the tradition and history implied by long enjoyment of a municipal charter; but that is not to say that boroughs such as the 60 referred to in the White Paper as having populations of less than 5,000 make the most satisfactory units that can be devised. Many of our small country towns are no larger than towns now included in a rural district, and I can see real advantage in the fusion of these small townships with their surrounding countryside. When I was considering this, I found that there were a large number of cases where this principle had already been in operation for over 100 years.
May I give the House three examples of areas of this kind? Leominster, in Herefordshire, with a population of 5,700 and an area of 8,700 acres; Tiverton with less than 10,000 people and nearly 18,000 acres; and, still more striking, Welshpool with a population of 5,600 and over 20,000 acres. I believe that this principle of linking small country towns with their surrounding countryside is not at all an impossible one to operate. On the financial side it is interesting to note that, with the modern development of rural services, there is no very wide difference between the average rates, including the county rates, in non-county boroughs and in rural districts. In England the average rate for the non-county boroughs in 1943–44 was just under 13s.; in the rural districts it was just under 12s. 3d. In Wales the average rate in the rural districts was actually

higher than in 'the non-county boroughs. So the difficulty suggested, that there was going to be great financial injustice if we brought such areas together, has largely disappeared.

Dr. Russell Thomas: The right hon. and learned Gentleman is not giving the whole picture. Is it not a fact that the assessments are very much lower in rural areas than in the towns?

Mr. Willink: I cannot, in the time at my disposal, give the whole picture.

Mr. Marshall: Could the Minister say whether the same applies to county boroughs to include certain rural areas?

Mr. Willink: There is no proposal to that effect in the White Paper, which suggests that the principle should be applied within the administrative counties. With regard to the extension of county boroughs—green belts, and so on—special considerations arise which are so varied that I do not propose to deal with them to-day, as they are not dealt with in the White Paper.
The second safeguard, the provision that an Order is to be laid before Parliament and to be subject to review by Parliament, would apply to Orders affecting the status and boundaries of counties and county boroughs, including Orders that decide against a status of that kind; and the White Paper says that the precise form of the parliamentary procedure is being worked out in detail. I cannot at the moment say more than that the Parliamentary control of Orders of this type may, I think, well be the new form of procedure to which the Prime Minister referred in an answer he gave to a Question in the House on the 20th June last year, referring to Orders to be made under the legislation for the new water policy. The general purpose would be to devise a procedure which would be appropriate for dealing with objections both of principle and of detail, and to secure that objections of principle would be dealt with normally on the Floor of the House but objections of detail would go elsewhere, to be subjected to a close examination of facts and figures before a joint committee of both Houses. It is, I think we must all agree, of great importance to ensure a reduction in the very great expenditure which proceedings of this nature have hitherto always involved.
Two questions have been asked since the issue of the White Paper with which I should like to deal. First, how would the Commission proceed? On that I would say it would be the duty of the Commissioners to pass under review the whole of England and Wales but not necessarily to hold a local inquiry with regard to every area in the country. That would be a quite unnecessary expenditure of time and money. There are a number of counties where the county review has been energetic and successful and where it is doubtful whether further alterations are called for. I think, too, that there arc many county boroughs where no one would wish to suggest any extension or alteration of the boundaries. It is therefore suggested that the Commissioners would be compelled to hold a local inquiry only in the following circumstances: first, with regard to county borough extensions or the creation of new county boroughs, on the application of the council of the borough; second, with regard to minor adjustments—alterations of boundaries and status—within the county, on the application of the county council; third, in any type of case—including those I have mentioned and any adjustment affecting county or county borough status or boundaries—on a request from the Minister. That means that it would not be within the power of a non-county borough or an urban or rural district to compel an inquiry, though it could, of course, invite the county council or the Minister or both to do so. It is obvious that the Commission would never finish its work if every minor authority throughout the country which wanted to make some alteration in its boundaries could compel an inquiry; but I want to make it quite clear that no local authority of any type will have its status or boundaries altered against its wishes without a local inquiry. It is not the intention that there should be any exception whatever to this rule, though the White Paper has given rise to some misconception on this point.

General Sir George Jeffreys (Peters-field): When the right hon. and learned Gentleman talks about a local inquiry, does he mean it would be a public inquiry?

Mr. Willink: Certainly. The second point I want to mention, and on which questions have been raised, is the very

important one whether it is right to leave the Minister with no power to reject or modify an Order made by the Commissioners. I regard this as a crucial point in the proposals; for if the power to reject or modify were there, it would imply a duty to consider representations against the Order; and that consideration of objections could be proper and effective only if the whole of the facts and the circumstances were again reviewed, with due notice to everybody who was interested. In short, there would have to be a further local inquiry. If the Commission's Orders had to be approved by the Minister, he would either have to approve them as a matter of course—in which case he would be a mere rubber stamp—or he would have to be prepared to reopen the whole matter and then what would happen to our attempt to reduce expenditure?
There is one more point with regard to the Commissioners. The White Paper contemplates an annual report to be presented to Parliament by the Commission. I believe that it would be most valuable that Parliament should be informed from year to year by a Commission of exceptional competence of the difficulties they had encountered in the course of their work, and of any difficulties in the general local government system which their inquiries disclosed. The Government attach great importance to this part of the proposals.
I can refer only inadequately to the two special problems of Middlesex and London. As to Middlesex, a county which is more urban than any other except London and one which is known, if I may say so, for the very high quality of its administration, the proposal is that the Commissioners should not be empowered to entertain applications for county borough status. In other respects it would not differ at all from the rest of the country. As regards London, it is proposed to exclude the administrative county from the operations of the Commission. It is proposed to appoint an authoritative body—I would say a small and expert body—to advise the Government on local government problems within the County of London. Now some, I know, regard this as too limited a proposal, and, of course, it is the case that there are many subjects in which a review, limited by the boundaries of the L.C.C. area, is an inadequate approach to the problem. But an inquiry such as is suggested would be


a long-term affair and I think everybody who is at all familiar with the county, feels that there is a more limited field which needs attention urgently. The work of the authorities within this area during the war, in the course of which they have had to meet very grievous and severe strains, is fully recognised; but I do not think that anybody is satisfied either with the present layout of the Metropolitan Boroughs or with the allocation of functions between the Metropolitan Boroughs and the London County Council. It is with these two problems that the Government would like to deal, with all possible expedition.
I promised in the earlier part of my speech to say something about local government finance but I rather fear that I am staying on my feet longer than I intended. The general Exchequer grant, commonly called the block grant, and the Government's proposals for dealing with it is a matter on which hon. Members will expect something to be said. I would recall the main features of the system, as laid down by the Local Government Act of 1929 and as it now stands. The House will remember that the block grant is based on the aggregate expenditure of all local authorities and is distributed amongst the authorities largely on the basis of their relative needs as determined by a statutory formula. It is, in fact, a form of supplementary income to local authorities, and the greater the charge upon the authority the greater its share of the income.
Under the Act of 1929, the grant for the whole country was to be fixed for a certain number of years, called the "fixed grant period." which, to start with, was three years and is now five years. The share of each local authority in the total grant is also fixed for each of the fixed grant periods. Originally the grant was distributed on the basis of compensation for loss of rates by de-rating and for the abolition of certain Exchequer grants, the remainder of the grant being distributed on the basis of the formula. The system provided that, in each of the fixed grant periods, the distribution should be determined more by reference to the formula and less by reference to loss of rates and grant. In the period beginning with 1947 distribution would be wholly on the basis of the formula, but the war has cut across all

these plans. The fixed grant period which should have run from 1942 to 1947 had to be postponed and, by an Act passed in 1941, the third period and the basis for distributing grants at that time were extended until Parliament should otherwise determine Even before the outbreak of the war, it had been recognised that some revision of the formula was due and provision for that revision was made by the Local Government (Financial Provisions) Act, 1937. Any revision based on that review would, but for the war, have already been completed.
Thus there are two problems. First, the formula is still unrevised; and, secondly, the fixed grant period of 1937 to 1942 has been extended. The recalculation of the total grant which should have taken place in 1943 has not, in fact, been made; and the local authorities have, in consequence, suffered a substantial loss of grant. The Government propose to deal with both these problems, and, as soon as possible, to consult the local government associations with a view to an investigation of the results of the present formula and suggestions for its revision. As the Chancellor of the Exchequer indicated in an answer given in this House, in any such revision there would be a definite bias in favour of the poorer authorities. Earlier investigations of this kind have been carried out by a joint conference of financial advisers appointed by the local government associations and of officers of the Ministry of Health, and I think that some similar arrangement seems suitable for the investigation which is now proposed.
But, while we hope that the review will begin in the near future, it cannot be completed until the necessary information is available, and this depends upon the date at which conditions become reasonably stable. Any formula must be based in the main on the distribution of population, and it would be idle to expect that, during a period of perhaps two or even three years after the end of the European War, the resettlement of the population will have progressed far enough to provide a satisfactory basis for a long-term scheme. In view of this inevitable lapse of time before a fully revised block grant can be brought into operation, the negotiating body will be asked to consider in addition whether there is a case for some


interim measure to deal with the second of the two problems—the fact that the fixed grant period of 1937–42 was extended and the grant stabilized. Such an interim measure, while leaving the distribution of the existing grant unaffected, might provide for the distribution of a supplementary sum based on the estimated increase in the aggregate expenditure of local authorities since 1937, and, in considering the distribution of any such supplementary sum, there would he a similar direction that the bias should be in favour of the poorer authorities.
Our local government system is complex. The discussion of any change is bound to be contentious. But I commend this Motion with confidence, because I believe that the proposals in the 'White Paper are those that are most suited to meeting the needs of to-day, and that early legislation on the lines that are suggested would be of great benefit.

1.5 p.m.

Mr. Arthur Greenwood: I find myself in some difficulty because of the actual terms of the Motion before the House. It has been the practice, in discussions on White Papers, to put down an innocuous Motion to which objection could not be taken, and, often enough, this Motion has 'been arrived at by agreement through the usual channels. This Motion, however, uses words which I and my hon. Friends find it difficult to accept. It states:
That this House welcomes the intention of the Government to preserve the existing framework of the county and county borough system of local government.…
These words cut across certain aspects of the policy of my party, and it would look as if the door was being closed to alterations in the structure of local government, which, I am sure, is not my right hon. and learned Friend's intention. He and I had a word about it the other morning, and, subject to its being understood that this is not intended as a statement of finality, then, of course, we can accept the Motion.
As to the White Paper itself, I agree with a good deal of what my right hon. and learned Friend has said, but it is timid, I think, and it is inadequate. I realise the difficulties of the present situation. I am fully aware of the reluctance of local authorities to relinquish any

powers that they have hitherto enjoyed. I know something about the tussle between county boroughs, and even municipal boroughs, and county councils. I have for many years been up to the neck in it in the West Riding of Yorkshire, where a powerful county council always stands at the gate to resist any extension of boundaries of any area in the existing West Riding county; and I appreciate also what I think is really the governing factor in this situation—the new responsibilities which are now being piled upon local authorities. I can see that there is a case for not uprooting the structure of local government—if ever it could be done in this country, which seems to be doubtful, except over the dead bodies of most of the representatives of local authorities—and a case for not making fundamental alterations in that structure or filling the minds of local authorities now engaged with these new and increasingly important tasks, and increasing their anxieties while they are tackling this job of new and developing services. They would like what the Minister called an element of stability. I see that; but, on the other hand—and I am not putting this as a matter of argument or disputation—if time had permitted, which it does not, it would seem to be logical to make such changes in the system of local government as would enable the new responsibilities falling on local authorities to be properly discharged. We are, I think, having to make the best of a bad job in this business. That I do appreciate; but there is still time for further consideration of the question of areas and powers. My right hon. and learned Friend, I was glad to see, gave little countenance to the widely-expressed fears that we are to have shackled upon us for ever his Regional Commissioners.

The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Herbert Morrison): They have done a very good job.

Mr. Greenwood: We agree with my right hon. Friend over the Commissioners' war work, but they will become a fifth wheel to the coach in the post-war years if we try to find a place for them. Four years ago, when looking into the problem with my right hon. and learned Friend who is now the Minister of National Insurance, for some unknown reason I got tired of this regionalism. I cannot think of a worse solution for our problem than a new


heavy dose of regionalism, but we ought to look at the problem of the scope of regionalism. It is true, as the Minister has said, that there are certain services now which are beyond the capacity of any single local authority to handle effectively. On the other hand, we have to look at the problem also in terms of national policy. My right hon. and learned Friend's view on the Water Bill, which is to be discussed next week—I will not argue whether it is adequate or inadequate—is a recognition of the need for a national policy dealing with water. Whether that policy is effective or not, it is a recognition of the fact That certain problems have passed out of the stage of final control by local authorities. I suggest that these problems, in the intervening period before any big changes are made in the future, should be considered.
I hold a very strong view myself on the importance of keeping alive an active local interest in the affairs of the district in which people live, and that there is something in local pride and local patriotism. Some local authorities tend to a measure of overlordship, but, on the whole, I think our system of local government works as well as that in any other country in Europe or elsewhere. It stands nearer to the people, and it really is at the very heart of democracy, something which is handling human problems of everyday life of primary interest to the people. We must, therefore, even at the expense of a little efficiency, I think, keep alive the active spirit of local government life. Having said that, I would like to say that I approve my right hon. and learned Friend's proposal for a Local Government Boundary Commission. Changes there must be. Certain changes, in my view, are already overdue, and I would like to see the discussion of these questions taken outside this building and outside Private Bill Committees. I know of no body which will be charged with more responsible duties than this Boundary Commission, and therefore great care will have to be taken in choosing the members.
What I think is one of the roots of our problem, crying aloud for solution now, is the relation between national and local finance. That is why I say the White Paper is inadequate. What my right hon. and learned Friend has said about Exchequer grants—block grants—does not carry us very far. Indeed, it does

not touch the problem now facing our local government authorities. I remember having discussions four years ago with an old political opponent, then a colleague, the late Sir Kingsley Wood, as Chancellor of the Exchequer, a Chancellor who had a very considerable knowledge of local government as a former Minister of Health. We felt then that the nearer we approached to peace-time days, and reconstruction became the order of the day, we should be faced with what I regard as a great financial and constitutional crisis between the State and local authorities. Consider what has happened. The indebtedness of many local authorities has increased during the war. Many of them have suffered the destruction of rateable value in their own areas, although new and very heavy burdens have been imposed on them. Enemy damage is very serious in many areas, and may prove to be a crushing burden on certain local authorities. I do not want to go into that aspect of it, but I should have thought that that burden ought to remain primarily on the State, because it was due to enemy action.
Education is going to be a very heavy burden. We had some account of the annual cost of it during the discussions on the Education Bill and to that we must add the new services, school meals, and so on, and also the Burnham scales which we are to discuss on Tuesday afternoon. The health services which are being prepared will also place heavy burdens upon the local authorities. If there is to be the amount of replanning of areas which we ought to have—I know they are a long-term investment and a very fine investment for local authorities —that will be a tremendously heavy burden in the early days. Take the question of housing: five years or more now with practically no houses built; five years more of further dilapidation of old houses, many of which really ought to be dispensed with altogether; five years' development of population and five years of damage to houses in many parts of the country and a lot of the damage not yet disclosed in many of the blitzed areas. We are faced with a housing problem which dwarfs any housing problem with this House has ever had a face. We are faced with burden after burden and we are now in the region of super-astronomical figures of expenditure. With this piling-


up of expenditure and these difficulties which have been created during the war period, we have an inequality of burdens due to a very defective rating system, which derating and the block grant policy have done very little to remedy.
The primary need now—and I put it as high in the priorities of the Government as any other problem—is for my right hon, and learned Friend, and the Chancellor and representatives of such other Departments as are interested, to sit down with the representatives of the associations of local authorities and look at the problem of straightening out the relations between national finance and local finance. I am not one of those who want to make everybody a national charge. I think an element of financial responsibility locally is a very good thing. I said "an element." I am arguing that it is not going to be an element, but a large component. I really do think—and this is what I regard as the greatest defect in the White Paper—that this problem has not been faced as yet. It is going to be very difficult to solve. The number of factors involved in the problem are considerable, delicate and complicated, but we will never get the services to which this House has committed itself—will not solve the housing problem, will not get health services going, will not get schools built and the educational system we want—into operation for years and years. Our local government system, of which I think very highly and which is an integral and vital part of our whole life, ought to be able to stabilise itself, with the knowledge that it is equipped financially to carry the burdens imposed by Parliament. If we secure that, then there will be prospects less gloomy than they seem to be now for the years after the war. Without a solution of this problem, all our other work will be in vain.

1.22 p.m.

Mr. David Eccles: I would like to congratulate my right hon. and learned Friend the Minister for the very practical and therefore conservative way in which he has tackled the knotty problem of local government. Listening to the Minister's speech and to the speech of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Wakefield (Mr. Greenwood), we see what a tremendous task we set ourselves when we insist on using independent local

government as the vehicle for the execution of a social policy which is national in scope. It is a fact that independent local government is a buttress of freedom, but it is also seen that it may conflict with blue-printed efficiency and with the attainment of uniform standards. To reconcile those two apparent opposites of decentralisation and efficiency is our task, and it is one for which the nation is well fitted and which we shall not abandon. Looking at the White Paper and listening to my right hon. and learned Friend it would appear that the aspects of local government which demand our attention are the quality of the persons who serve local governments as councillors or officials; the duties imposed on them and the areas in which they perform them; and lastly, this question of the assistance from the Exchequer to the local authorities.
I was very glad to hear the Minister make such a point of the personnel of local government. It is easy to overlook the councillors themselves when we are thinking about administrative systems and tidying up areas, but I think every hon. Member would agree that a fine school building is very little use if the headmaster is an ass and his staff no better. It is much the same with a town hall and "Mr. Mayor," his council and his officers. How, then, can we secure that enough sensible and able people come forward to take on these important and increasing burdens of public work? Something can be done if employers will release councillors to attend meetings without financial loss or other hindrance. I was delighted to hear the Minister state precisely the same conclusion I had come to, namely, that only a big increase in the number of women employed in local government will really meet the situation. An important discovery of this war has been the national value of part-time work by women. When one considers that the health and education of children and the housing of the people are two of the main provinces of local government it is obvious that mothers and housewives are admirably fitted to advise and direct the administration which takes care of these family concerns.
I would say a word about the local government officers. I cannot help thinking that local authorities should regard the next few years as an emergency period, and that they should imitate


what the central Civil Service did when dealing with the emergency period of the war. They should be willing to co-opt from outside men and women who have had experience of a particular kind, such as architects, into their numbers as temporary local civil servants. I doubt very much whether the housing problem can be solved without a transfusion of blood into the ranks of local government such as we have had in the Ministry of Aircraft Production and the Ministry of Supply. Speaking as a once-temporary civil servant myself I know that permanent civil servants treat the co-opted members very well, and I believe that the same would happen in the local authorities.
Turning now to the problem of the areas, the Minister was right when he said that town and country are becoming mixed up, but the differences are still important. The speed of the horse and cart laid down these boundaries, and the lorry and the bus are beginning to rob them of their importance, but, none the less, the traditions and habits of the horse age are respectable and strong, and it will be much easier to manage the evolution from the horse age to the motor transport age by negotiation and not by compulsion. I was glad to hear that non-county boroughs and rural district councils will not have their boundaries altered against their wishes without the right to a local inquiry, and I suggest that when those local inquiries are held, so swiftly does modern transport interlock the interests of one area within a county and another, that all the local authorities in a county area should be represented at any local inquiry within their area.
The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Wakefield has said, and many competent critics believe, that the White Paper is too optimistic about the ability of the existing system to bear the financial burdens of extended social services that will shortly be put upon local authorities. On the other hand, I rather take the view that the White Paper's optimism is justified, but it is very difficult to allay the fears of those who are familiar with the finances of the poor areas after the last war. I refer especially to the rural areas, where the de-rating of agricultural land left the basis of taxation too narrow for those authorities to raise the new money which was necessary for long-term im-

provements. I am not competent to speak about the finances of blitzed areas, but I hope that the burden caused by the enemy will be borne by. the State. War, in any case, disturbs the equilibrium of local government finance by adding to expenditure and by holding down revenue. In the first place, the cost of the pre-war services is increased by the general rise in prices which always occurs in a war, and to that is added the cost of new or extended social services at the end of the war. War always blows the dust off old things and fans into flame innumerable sparks of reform, but these reforms cost money and the House can see how the two pincers of expenditure are closing in on the resources of local authorities, by recalling the Financial Memorandum which accompanied the Education Bill. In that Memorandum estimates—I thought and said at the time, and still think, that they were underestimates—were given of the cost of prewar education at post-war prices, and the cost of the new services. The two increases together are formidable and the real difficulty comes from the fact that local authorities cannot easily expand their revenue even to meet the increased costs due to the rise in prices.
As hon. Members will know, those difficulties are largely not of the creation of local authorities but are due to Acts of Parliament. I refer to rent restriction. War causes a housing shortage, and this war has added destruction of property to the usual effects of the stopping of new building. There inevitably follows a demand which it is impossible to refuse on social grounds for the control of rents, and as valuations for rates are tied up with the actual rents paid, it becomes impossible for local authorities to mark up their property values in step with the rise in the money value of the property due to the increase in prices. At the very moment when local government revenue ought to be expanding, we find it is held down by rent restrictions, and the rating system, which never recovered from these effects after the last war, is now in even worse disorder.
It is knowledge of these difficulties which prompts, to a large degree, the demand for larger and larger grants from the Exchequer. Even those eminent students and champions of the rating system, Professor and Mrs. Hicks, say that the public would prefer the cost of the


new social services to be borne by the taxes rather than by the rates. If the public are thinking on those lines, and in respect of the total cost of the new services, then a word of warning is very necessary because, as the White Paper says, the wholesale shifting of burdens from the ratepayer to the taxpayer is no solution. Such a transfer would destroy the responsible character of local government. I think it might come about in this way. It is a melancholy fact that all elected assemblies contain a certain number of cranks and, in local councils, these cranks, by their enthusiasm and importunity, would persuade their fellow committee men to spend the ratepayers' money badly if they could point to the fact that the Treasury was contributing, say, 19s. in the pound, and the financial responsibility of such an authority would be undermined. Unless the independent and responsible character of local government is preserved, then the centralisers and the efficiency-mongers will be able to overturn the system, and unless a serious proportion of the expenditure of any local authority is raised by that local authority, its independent and responsible character will go.
That being the case, local authorities are faced with a crisis in their finances. They cannot mark up the property values in their areas to match the rise in prices. There is, therefore, nothing they can do but to increase the poundages—the number of shillings in the pound collected on any given valuation. Now, for some psychological reason, it is undoubtedly true that ratepayers fancy themselves on the verge of ruin when rates go up several shillings, and especially if that mystical figure of 20s. in the pound is in sight. What matters, however, is the proportion of the income of the ratepayer which is being taken from him in local taxation, and it would not be difficult to show that if all the poundages in the Kingdom were raised by the amount by which the general level of prices will have increased by the end of the war, say by one-third, the ratepayers of the country would be paying less of their income than they were before.

Mr. Hugh Lawson: Does the hon. Gentleman mean less in proportion or less in actual money?

Mr. Eccles: Less in proportion; more in money, naturally, because the poundage will have gone up on the same valuation.
Local authorities which are anxious to preserve their integrity and their independence ought to set about explaining to the ratepayers that the dustman wants more wages, that school repairs cost more, and that coke to heat the town hall costs nearly double, and so on, and that therefore it is not unreasonable to ask them to contribute at least the same proportion of their income as they did before the war. In my submission, only when that has been done is it right for the Exchequer to come along and give larger grants.
The Minister said that the formula would have to be revised. That is undoubtedly true but I think if one examines the working of the formula, the astonishing thing is how well it has been used to offset the hotch-potch in valuations which we have had for so many years. The reason for that is that the difference in the valuation of property between one area and another, which is so well known, counts for so very little in the determination of the grant. However, we need a new formula, and I must say that I was not quite satisfied, if I heard my right hon. and learned Friend aright, about the principle on which he suggested the new formula should be based. I understood him to say that the new formula should be based on population. Surely the real principle is the income per head in the area, the proportion of that income which is paid in rent, and the relation between the rates paid and that proportion. I am afraid that is a rather complicated principle, but I believe it will be found to be the only true one. I have nothing more to say on this question of finance, except to hope that some hon. Member will examine the fascinating subject of the relation between the rates and the rise in poundages that must come about and the new housing programme. There must be a very definite effect on new building if the rates go up and that, I believe, requires most careful examination.
In conclusion I would remind the House that the concentration of power in any one place is an enemy to liberty, and local government is our way of distributing the increased volume of power which has to be placed in the hands of the Executive in a modern society. It often happens in political affairs that the object and the instrument of policy are seen to be interchangeable. The House


may remember, that Julius Caesar said that with money we can get men, and with men we can get money. I would say this afternoon that, with freedom, we can get independent local government, and with independent local government we can get freedom.

1.41 p.m.

Mr. Clement Davies: The speech delivered by the Minister was along the lines that I expected, but the first part of the speech of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Wakefield (Mr. Greenwood) rather surprised me. The complacent way in which the leader of the Socialist Party looks upon this question at the present moment is certainly rather startling. Perhaps his association with the Coalition has rather weakened what used to be regarded by all of us as a very bold spirit.
I join issue at once with the Minister. He said that it was inexpedient to make any change now; that it was right for us to wait to see what burdens would be put on by this House in respect of education, water, health services. If ever there was a case of putting the cart before the horse, this is a most striking example. Just think. New rates will be added to the cart. Along will come the Minister of Education and put a burden of about £10,000,000 into the cart. Along will come the Minister of Health—I do not know what is the situation in regard to housing, whether that is a matter for the Ministry of Health or one of the numerous new Ministries which have been created—and put still another burden into the cart. All the time, the cart is being loaded up, no attention is being paid to the power of the horse. The cart is the same size, although the horse may be a huge shire animal, or a little Welsh mountain pony. Then we are invited to say that that is the right way to approach this question, and that it is perfectly expedient.
If there is one question that should have received first consideration by this House, it is the question of local government administration. Parliament can only lay down general principles, but the administration of the law and the day-to-day burdens and the day-to-day contact with the people are a matter for local authorities. Since these authorities were created between 1885 and 1894 Parlia-

ment has continued to add to their burdens, and at the present moment we are threatening to add even more to them than the duties mentioned by the right hon. and learned Gentleman. There has been a great deal of talk—I am sorry it is only talk so far—with regard to the re-allocation of industry. There has been a great deal of talk in a White Paper and in a Report about the conquest of unemployment and the achievement of full employment. As part and parcel of that there will be further expenditure by the local authorities, who, I should have thought, would have been the very first to question who are the persons who will be called upon to carry out these duties, what is to be their financial power, and whether they are capable of undertaking them adequately.
The right hon. and learned Gentleman drew cheers from the House—and he was supported again by the right hon. Member for Wakefield—in talking about tradition—a sort of nostalgia with regard to the past and the Middle Ages. There ought to be only one test with regard to all Governments, and certainly with regard to local governments, and that is, What is best capable of carrying out the wishes of the people? What is the form of local government which is best capable of rendering to the people the benefits that Parliament desires to give? What of these councils? They were created by Acts of Parliament from 1885 to 1894, at the end of one of the worst periods in history so far as the well-being of our people was concerned. They were created towards the end of the Victorian era, a great era of the expansion of industry, when factories and houses were placed wherever a person decided to put them, without any regard whatsoever to the welfare of the people, their families, or future generations. [An HON. MEMBER: "The railways."] I will come to those in a moment.
These Acts were passed at a time when the highest regard was being paid to individuals who built up their wealth by marching to their goal over the graves of their fellowmen. They were the heroes of the Victorian era. Heavy is the debt that we to-day have to pay for the slums which they were allowed to build, and the chaos they were allowed to introduce into the land. These Acts were passed at a time when fields and villages were growing into towns, and towns into districts like the


Black Country, South Wales, Midlothian, parts of Lancashire and the West Riding of Yorkshire, where no one, except an official with a map in his hand, can tell where one town ends and another begins. That is the period when those Acts were passed. It was at a time when there had been practically no change in methods of transport or communication from time immemorial.
An hon. Member referred just now to railways, but the railways, which came into existence some 40 or 50 years before, are stabilised. They do not help very much in the administration or coverage of an area. If these Acts had been passed at the time of King Alfred, they might have worked well. The area capable of being administered depended on the distance the official could walk or ride in discharging his duties. If he wanted information it could only be obtained by personal contact, by walking to see someone else, or sending another person to get it for him. I have often regretted that these Acts were passed at that time. I wish the Conservatives of the day had had their way, because they bitterly opposed them. If only we had waited until 1906 or 'gm, when two things happened which made a world of difference—the coming into being of the motor car and the telephone—the whole structure would have been different. To-day we can communicate with people in very wide areas and, if necessary, officials can go to their work or inspection by car. In my own county, until 35 years ago, one certainly could not go from one end of it to the other in the same day. It took three days. To-day one can cover the whole of the county in a very short time. Therefore, I see no reason for this nostalgic appeal on behalf of these ancient councils.
What is the structure we are asked to approve? The Motion says:
That this House welcomes the intention of the Government to preserve the existing framework of the county and county borough system. …
Before I come actually to the councils themselves let me make some admissions at once. Any suggestion of a change of system will meet with the most violent opposition from every councillor in the land. That can be seen in the reports which have been issued already by the various associations. I am not doing it a great injustice if I say that the County Councils' Association Report comes to

this: "We are doing our work extraordinarily well, and we cannot see that much change is needed. If there is any fault at all it lies with the urban and rural councils."

Sir Joseph Lamb: No, it does not say that.

Mr. Davies: The municipal councils, on the other hand, say: "We are in no difficulty, it is only the other councils." All this is only natural. There are many councillors who are conscientious, and who are doing excellent work and devoting time, which they can ill spare, to work on behalf of their fellowmen. But, let us be honest, there are many councillors who think that to become a member of a council is to receive a well-deserved honour for services rendered in the past. What do the Government say about this problem?
There is no general desire in local government circles for a disruption of the present system.
Naturally, one would not expect anybody to be enthusiastic about committing suicide. One would not ask them to be enthusiastic about that, and that is used as an excuse for doing nothing. The next point is that it is impossible to make any radical change without inquiry. I entirely agree. Many of us had been asking for that inquiry long before the war started. Perhaps I may be allowed to make a personal reference to myself. At the request of the Minister's predecessor I carried out a very long inquiry in my own country, in Wales. I went through every part of it; I thought I knew it well. I probably knew it better when the inquiry started than almost anybody else, and I thought I could give a true description of my country. But so far as I can see there is no difference between administration there and any part of England or Scotland. After I had made the inquiry, and heard evidence of over 100 doctors, official after official, and saw things for myself, I could scarcely describe my own horror of the words I penned in the report of that inquiry. I am certain that if I went into Scotland, Lancashire, Yorkshire, or any part of the land, I would find much the same kind of thing. Is it, then, to be said that these people must always be praised?
After that inquiry, in which my colleague and I dwelt upon the difficulties


of the authorities, geographically and otherwise, and their poverty, we wrote:
While we are well aware of these difficulties, and give them due weight, we are, nevertheless, of the opinion that the authorities have fallen far short of their duties and their obligations. We find that they have had insufficient regard for their powers or their duties, or the advice tendered them by their officers. In fact, they have failed in their trusteeship as guardians of the health and welfare of the people who elected them.
I have no doubt that I would find the same conditions in any other part of the land. [HON. MEMBERS: "No."] Well, I challenge those Members to conduct an inquiry as I conducted that inquiry, with an eminent doctor sitting alongside who had held an important position under the Government. Let hon. Members go through the land as I did—

Sir J. Lamb: Is there nothing good in Wales, or in any other part of the country? There are good and bad in every district.

Mr. Davies: Of course there are.

Sir J. Lamb: Then do not say that it is all bad.

Mr. Davies: I have said nothing of the kind. I say that there should be no distinction in the carrying out of the duties, that benefits to be given to the people should be the same wherever they may be. May I put it in a sentence? Privileges given to one and denied to another are obnoxious in themselves, but when privileges are given to one out of public money and denied to another the position becomes intolerable. That is why I point out that these failures and neglects do exist. To a large extent it is due to the fact that the authorities are small, and cover large areas in which there arc small populations. Therefore, they have a very small amount of money to come from a penny rate. The White Paper itself has given the figures with regard to those with populations of under 2,500. It states that in England and Wales there are 21 non-county boroughs and 49 urban districts with populations of less than 2,500; that there are 39 non-county boroughs and 108 urban districts with populations of between 2,500 and 5,000. The product of their penny rate is so small that they cannot possibly carry out, as we would like to see them carry out, the duties we are continually thrusting upon them.
I gave the figures also with regard to each one of them in Wales. I can well understand some defence being put forward for the old charter boroughs which unfortunately, owing to a change in circumstances, have lost a large number of their old people. But, while I can understand those, which are small enough, I cannot possibly understand how urban district councils came to be created under the Act of 1894 with the small populations that they possess. I could give three instances from Wales of urban district council areas with populations respectively of 672, 782 and 807, in which a 1d. rate brings in £16, £22 and £12. It is sheer absurd nonsense.
Then I gave a list of some 15 urban district council areas with populations under 2,000, a penny rate bringing in £14 in the smallest and in the largest £36. How can we expect them to deal with housing and water problems and the multifarious duties which we ask them to carry out? I put before the right hon. and learned Gentleman the case of the little borough where I was brought up, where a penny rate produces £18. They have now to go in for a water scheme for themselves alone, the initial cost of which will be something like £6,000. It is no good getting a water scheme unless it is accompanied by a proper sewage scheme, and the total cost will amount to something like £13,000. The truth of the matter is that it is a fiddle-de-dee scheme. We ought to have had a bigger scheme covering the region, so that water could be sent down the valley to the other villages, but with the present local government structure that little borough has to provide for itself.
My second objection is overlapping. The powers of the county councils are strictly limited. How often do we find that the people are suffering because of some state of things and the county council say it is not their duty to attend to it, and the rural district council say it is not their duty, and in the meantime the people suffer? In my own county there are villages which suffer from periodical flooding. I cannot imagine anything more distressing to the housewife. It has been happening year after year. Ask one council to put it right and they say it is not their duty. It is for another council. What causes most anger in me is that each council within the county has its own medical officer of


health. Doubtless he has reported on a certain state of things which he says is very obnoxious, but the council has done nothing with regard to it. The county council has its own medical officer of health, but, if he sees anything wrong, he cannot do anything himself. He can only direct the attention of the doctor of the district council, who can either write a polite letter back or ignore him altogether. I have felt throughout that the county borough council is far and away the most efficient, with its officials under it, responsible for everything within its boundaries. I do not say that it is going to be the solution for the whole country but it prevents overlapping and directs attention to duties which have to be performed and, if there is a complaint, you know where to make it.
Now may I pass to finance? The time has really come when we should make up our minds what is to be the burden on the State and what on the ratepayers. I have always been against the rates. They are an anachronism. It seems an extraordinary state of things that a man who makes improvements which will benefit the health of his own family and of the neighbourhood is taxed, whereas if he allows his house to go to rack and ruin and become a nuisance, his rates are lowered. But, apart from that, the time has obviously come when we must consider what burden can be borne by the ratepayer. Much has been said about education, housing and water, but there is one burden which I have not yet heard mentioned—roads. In respect of second-class roads no direct grant is made to these councils. In a rural area, the second-class road is as vital and important as the first-class. Often it is an artery of supply. It is different from the by-roads in a town, which only see an occasional coal cart or milk van. To-day heavy milk lorries come along and knock the road about. The House will be startled at these figures. It is estimated that for next year, making allowance for every penny of the grant that we get from the Treasury, our roads alone are going to cost us 8s. 9d. in the pound. The average for England is 4s., for England and Wales 4s. 4d., and for Wales alone 5s. 6d.
Is not that an illustration of the fact that the time has come for a readjustment of these matters? Long ago there should have been a Royal Commission of the

strongest kind that we could devise to inquire into the whole system and structure of local government. May I incidentally mention the method of election? If there is one place where Proportional Representation ought to be considered, it is in local government, The Minister and others have referred to the desirability of more women going on to local authorities. I have been asking for it for years. They are, and ought to be, more interested in these things. It is the local authority which deals with the everyday life of the household and the school. But so often, unless she belongs to a particular party in a particular place, a woman has no chance of being elected. It is obvious now that we cannot have any radical change in the immediate future. The Government has made up its mind that we have to go on with the old system, patching it up as best we can. It would take a long time to get a real adjustment between local and national expenditure by means of a Royal Commission. All I would ask is that further grants should be made here and now from the Treasury to help these people who, because of their poverty, have suffered in the past and who are so anxious to give their people the benefits which they see enjoyed by those in wealthier areas. If the Government do that, they will render a great service.

2.13 p.m.

Mr. Colegate: I fully sympathise with the hon. and learned Gentleman as to the need for quick consideration of questions of finance, but I must protest most strongly against the wholesale and sweeping charges that he brought against the people who carry on the different systems of local government. It is definitely not true that rural, urban and county councils do not carry out their work on the whole with efficiency and with great public service. There are, of course, failures, but so there are in Government Departments. Pick out the largest authority you can and you will find that at times it makes mistakes. But, by and large, we have had 50 years' experience of the present system and on the whole it has worked with very great effectiveness. Professor Trevelyan gives a most remarkable picture of improvements that have taken place, particularly in the sphere of local government, in the last 50 years, and not to emphasise that point is to do a grave injustice to a large


body of public-spirited men and women who have given years of unpaid service to these questions. I mention that point, not so much to put myself in opposition to my hon. and learned Friend, but because it goes right to the root of this White Paper.
One of the main objects of the Paper is to reassure the local authorities that they are not to be interfered with, and are not, in the main, to be abolished, although adjustments are bound to be made, as it is right they should be. Speaking in general, the system is to go on. It is essential, as the Minister pointed out, that when we are putting new burdens on local authorities they should have some assurance of stability, and the power of attracting to their service the men and women whom we want to go and work on them. My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister referred in that wonderful speech not long ago to the reservoir of talent, energy and ability that we hope to draw on to refresh this House after the war. There are only 615 seats in this House—about 630 under the new arrangement—but there are thousands of seats on the county councils, county borough councils, urban district councils, municipalities and the rural district councils. We who speak on behalf of the rural district councils want to draw on that reservoir of men and women to come to aid us in the great tasks which Parliament is putting upon them. My hon. and learned Friend who preceded me was in favour of large areas. I did not follow his argument, for at one time it appeared as if he was recommending county boroughs for the hillsides of Wales.

Mr. C. Davies: What I said was that the county borough which has all the powers of a county council and a local council, was the best form of council, but I agreed that it could not be applied generally.

Mr. Colegate: At any rate, it is no solution of the question of the rural districts. Let us be clear what we mean when we talk about large areas, because the ideas of planners, especially those without knowledge of this subject, have created a definite feeling of apprehension in the minds of local authorities. It is true that with the motor car and the telephone we can administer large areas with greater ease than that with which we could administer areas of half or less than half

the size 50 years ago. We must not, however, look at this matter purely from the point of view of mechanism. We must take the living organism into account. The great attraction to me, in our method of local government to-day, is that it is a form of democracy which we do not get in our Parliamentary institutions.
There were two forms of democracy. There was the old classical form as practised in ancient Athens, where there was no representative government, but where the people met and discussed the questions of the day with their leaders. That is going on to-day in the local authorities. The people of each parish know their man and they discuss things with him outside the council. This is a form of democracy which we cannot get in our Parliamentary institutions. We have, as no other country in the world has done, produced the most perfect systems of democracy in each department of life. Do let us be careful that, in this local democracy, the close contact betweeen the people who are carrying out the various programmes, and the actual inhabitants of the locality, is not broken down and substituted by the nexus of telephone and motor-car. I want the personal touch. We cannot have it in our Parliamentary institutions, which must remain of a purely representative character. Parliament is a very long way from the village green and all the doings there, but in our system of local government, about which I am glad we have the reasurrances of the Minister and the White Paper, we have a system which enables the local man to keep in touch with the local inhabitants in a way that no other system can provide.

Mr. C. Davies: Would the hon. Member carry what he is saying to its logical conclusion, and say that all powers should he given to the parish council and all other councils be abolished?

Mr. Colegate: I am not a theoretician; I am a practical person and, therefore, I am accustomed to compromise. The question of practical importance is to choose some reasonably sized unit, so that the people can have intimate local contact with their representatives on the local authority.
I want to run through one or two points in the White Paper which concern the


rural districts. We accept the assurance that is given, and I hope that there will be no modification by any Department of that assurance. I am a little nervous about the reference on page 5 to the transfer of functions and about the footnote, in which there appears to be a loophole in the assurance. I hope that the right hon. lady the Parliamentary Secretary will be able to reassure us that it is not a hole out of which much will be able to slip, but that it is rather a safety valve for peculiar and special circumstances. The next point concerns local government finance. In the White Paper there is a considerable over-simplification of the financial system. I will not attempt to deal with the block grant system. It is very complicated. I understand it perfectly for one hour after it has been explained to me by experts, but at the end of the day, it begins to fade away. It must be completely overhauled. We had the Chancellor's assurance in October last that there was to be a general overhaul, but I am in agreement with other speakers, who press for an interim solution, to enable work to be carried on quickly with housing, water supply and other urgent matters. On page 8 of the Paper it is said, in connection with finance, that modifications can only be introduced when the material factors become known. The main material factor is known now. It is that the local authorities cannot afford to raise the money by the present rating system to enable them to provide for the various schemes of education and other services.
I would like to refer to page 12. I think that this Local Government Boundary Commission is an excellent device. I agree that the associations of local authorities should not be consulted or should not attempt to nominate any of the Commission. It is essential, however, that when the Commissioners are chosen there should be at least one who is thoroughly acquainted with rural problems. I do not think anybody would disagree about that. He must be thoroughly informed of rural matters, and know the state of feeling, and the sort of problems which are to be met with in the rural areas. In regard to the general directions to the Commission—which are largely the heart of this document, because until we see what the directions are we cannot come to any final decision—I hope the associations of local authorities

will be consulted. If I interpreted my right hon. and learned Friend rightly, he gave us an assurance that they were to be consulted before these formal documents are laid before Parliament.
The next question that I would like to mention is that of linking town and country. We ought to take a broad view of that question. At the same time, I must sound a note of warning. The case that has been presented is rather like this. Here is a rural area, in the middle of which is a small town to which the local farmer goes on market days and in which he makes his purchases. The seed merchant lives there, and he buys his fertilisers there; the shops are mainly for the agricultural population, and, although a town, it is truly the centre of the agricultural district. Many towns are being designed, however, and some are actually being erected, which are nothing like that. I have in my own area a town of 5,000 people which has no connection whatever with agriculture. It is a new satellite town. Many private firms, to my knowledge, and some Government Departments are considering the establishment of satellite towns in the country. I have no wish to oppose that, for I think it is a very good thing, but what I want to point out is that if a satellite town is combined with a rural area the agricultural and rural interest should not be allowed to be swamped by people who have got an industrial mentality.

Mr. Mack: Do I take it that people with an industrial mentality are less efficient than those with a rural mentality, and might vitiate them?

Mr. Colegate: Not at all. I am glad the hon. Member asked that question because it shows he has completely misunderstood the point. The point in the White Paper is that we might combine a small country town with its rural district round it because their interests are the same, and, therefore, the councillors of the combined authority would take the same point of view and deal with the interests in a similar manner. My point is that if you got an industrial mentality, which might be very much more efficient, it could not possibly have the knowledge or experience to deal with rural problems, which are the particular concern of the rural inhabitants.

Mr. Arthur Jenkins: I would like to get this point clear. I understood the hon. Gentleman to say he wad in favour of satellite towns and that he wants to segregate the industrial populations who live in them from the agricultural populations. As I understood the Minister, he thought that it would be to the advantage of both if they lived more together than they have done during the last century.

Mr. Colegate: The hon. Gentleman has rather missed the point. I have discussed this with the Minister, and the point is that where the town and country are so similar, it would be to the mutual advantage of both probably to combine. All I am pointing out is that, when the Commissioners consider linking up town and country, they must make a great distinction between what I would call the normal country market town and the satellite industrial town. They will be no more segregated than they are at present.
I want to deal with another point on the procedure before the Boundary Commission. I think that the county districts should have the same right as anybody else to request that a local inquiry be held. The Minister indicated in his speech that he could not agree to that point of view. I very seriously hope that he will reconsider the matter. I do not believe that in a very great many cases it would arise, but it will arise in some cases and it would give a feeling of confidence to the local district that they were not being put in a position in any way inferior to other parties to such inquiry.
I conclude as I began by referring to what I think as, next to finance, the most important problem of all. That is, the problem of so maintaining the prestige and status of local authorities that we shall get on these councils the new blood which we want. The programme before the councils is tremendous. As everybody has pointed out, particularly in housing, it is essential that we should get really good people, and especially in the rural districts people with knowledge of rural conditions. We have seen some astounding things done in the past by Government Departments. They have come down into the country and, with the greatest ignorance, have put up factories and aerodromes at places where anybody with local knowledge could have told them that they would have troubles with

draining. It has been brought home to the people of the country that the administration of the country districts must and shall remain in the hands of the people who live there.

2.31 p.m.

Mr. Marshall: I am glad to have an opportunity of saying a few words in this very important Debate. We have listened to some very interesting speeches. I was interested in the one delivered by the hon. and learned Member for Montgomery (Mr. C. Davies). I was hoping all the time he spoke that he would arrive at some conclusions, but at the end of his speech it seemed that the only conclusion he had arrived at was that we ought to have a thoroughgoing inquiry into the structure of local government. I think we should agree on that with the hon. and learned Member, but that is not a solution to the problems. At the beginning, the hon. and learned Member said that the Government had been adding to the burden of the local authorities for a very long time, but he drew no conclusions from that fact.

Mr. C. Davies: Perhaps the hon. Member will forgive me for interrupting, but I said I did not think we should make any radical change in the structure of local government without having an inquiry, and I did urge that the burdens which had been added to them for about 50 years should be inquired into.

Mr. Marshall: If the hon. and learned Member was using those facts in order to prove that an inquiry was necessary, I do not think we should disagree. He went on to give some very interesting facts about the creation of the present local authorities, and said that if the telephone and the railway had been invented before the local authorities were created, quite a different structure would have been chosen. I am not so sure about that. The local authorities celebrated their centenary a few years ago. They were created, as the hon. and learned Member said, in order to wipe up the mess of the industrial revolution which had involved the creation of slums all over the country, especially in the new industrial towns. The telephone and the railway could have had very little effect in that respect. There are, certainly, a number of anomalies in Wales, and we all know that anomalies in local government exist all


over the country, but I do not think the hon. and learned Member put forward any remedy for it. He made a very tentative suggestion, with which I played in my own mind for some time, for the creation of a system of county boroughs all over the country. I wish that were a solution of the problem. I suppose he would agree that those county boroughs should comprise within their boundaries great rural areas. I wish that were a solution, but, unfortunately, I am afraid it is not. I believe that the county borough in this country is the most perfect machine of democracy that has ever been created in this or in any other land, but owing to the inequalities and the different merits in each case, I am afraid that that is not a solution.
As I have said, we are dealing with an exceedingly important matter and I shall confine my remarks to the structure of local authorities. I know that finance is important. I welcome the statement that the Minister will consult local authorities about the revision of the block grant. Perhaps he will prepare some kind of interim proposal in order that the very heavy burdens that are to be placed on local authorities can be borne. What is the problem before us? It is not that local authorities have failed. As a matter of fact, they have immense achievements to their credit. The White Paper is right in paying tribute to those achievements. During the last 30 to 50 years, local government services have extended greatly and public opinion is in favour of the people of the country receiving those services. There is the shadow of the great new duties and functions that will be imposed upon the local authorities during the reconstruction period, and it is, therefore, necessary that we should hold that structure up to examination to see whether it can bear the stress and strain of those new duties or whether it requires some modification, or whether the time has come for a whole-hog, thorough, fundamental reconstruction of the local government machine. I have already said that I am a county borough man. I shall look at the problem to some extent from that aspect.
One speaker has pointed out the intimate connection there is between the local government elector and the man who is elected. It is a fact. This is one of the most valuable elements of local government to-day. The councillor is dealing

with matters not very far removed from his own doorstep, matters upon which he can impress his own personality. He is never very far away from the salutary influence of the electorate and of course he has his finger on the pulse of the community.

ROYAL ASSENT

Message to attend the Lords Commissioners.

The House went; and, having re-turned—

Mr. SPEAKER reported the Royal Assent to:
1. Representation of the People Act, 1945.
2. Nurses Act, 1945.

LOCAL GOVERNMENT WHITE PAPER (RECONSTRUCTION)

Question again proposed,
That this House welcomes the intention of the Government to preserve the existing framework of the county and county borough system of local government and the proposals for the establishment of a Local Government Boundary Commission outlined in the White Paper presented to Parliament.

Mr. Marshall: I was referring to the intimate relationship between the elector and the elected in local government. It keeps the one on his toes, and it gives the other a sense of being nearer to the seat of power, and a belief that he himself is really influencing the course of events. That, to me, is the core of local government, and in so far as we depart from that principle, we lose in the practice of democracy, and I believe in many other senses too. I do not argue that this intimacy is equal or uniform over the whole field of local government. It is not, but it certainly operates over a great part of it, and in my estimation it is the touchstone by which we should judge this White Paper. I am bound to say, as I look through its pages, that I am convinced the Minister has done his best to retain that intimate practice of democracy.
I have already said that local government in this country is not very old, and certain inevitable anomalies have grown up with it. These have been due to the progress of our national life—inequalities in area, rateable value, power, finance strain and efficiency. Also many thorny


problems have grown up over the boundary question. One admits all this kind of thing but even the critics of local government will admit that its achievements are immense. In one way or another, local government touches our life at all stages, from the cradle to the grave. It provides us with maternity hospitals, in which many of our citizens first see the light. It provides us with hospitals for the treatment of infectious diseases and sickness of all kinds. It takes the citizen at a very early age and begins to educate him. It provides him with roads on which to travel, houses in which to live, parks in which to play, transport on which to ride. It provides him with halls for his entertainment, and with wholesome water, and also takes away his waste products. It supplies him with light and heat, succours him in adversity, and when he passes away provides him with a sacred plot of land, where his relatives can pay their silent tributes to him. It also provides him with crematoriums from which his ashes can be scattered to the four winds of heaven.
Local government has made a gigantic contribution to our social life. It is all the more remarkable when one considers that it inherited the ugly and almost insoluble problems of the Industrial Revolution, in which what have been described as "the rookeries of the poor" were crowded together, 70 to the acre, the streets were open sewers, there was no water laid on for the houses, no amenities of any description. That was the legacy inherited by local government in this country. In these places diseases were rife, and consumption was taking its horrible toll of the population. In my own city of Sheffield, for example, we have, in my lifetime, cleared away 25,000 back to back houses and provided their inhabitants with houses, baths and gardens. No one can compute the change in our health conditions that this has brought about. It has been one titanic struggle to bring air and light into our industrial cities, and it has not yet finished. But we have reached a stage when we can already see the beginnings of this betterment, in which spacious open thoroughfares, seemly architecture and good planning are now making their appearance, and behind it all is a growing public opinion.
I think that the great creative period of local government is in front of us, and

with proper guidance from the central authority, and, may I say, financial help, I feel that local government will rise to it. I have described all this because I think this House should be very careful before it agrees to anything that would damage or injure something that has grown up in this country, of which we are very proud. If we consider what are regarded as the defects, we find that certain services, which were originally within the compass of local government, have expanded to such an extent, that we are compelled to take a national view of them. In short, we need a much larger unit of administration; these questions are too big to be confined to any of the local government unit boundaries of to-day.
Many people have said that we ought to abolish the whole machine, and create a local government structure in this country based on much wider areas. I do not intend to discuss the merits or demerits of what has come to be known as regionalism. It would be a fundamental change, needing a major Bill, and it would meet with the bitter hostility of the local government bodies of this country, both individually and collectively. There can be no possible doubt about that—and the Minister made it quite plain that the introduction of such a Measure—[Interruption]—I would say to my hon. Friend that that does not dispose of whether the question is right or wrong. On this particular matter the local authorities may be perfectly right. The introduction of such a Measure, I say, would necessarily have to be preceded by long inquiry in an un-favourable atmosphere. In the present mood of local authorities, any Bill on regional lines would be intensely controversial, and I hazard the opinion that it would not have a chance of passing through this House. We cannot wait for that solution, that is quite evident.
Let us look at one or two problems that are facing us. Education has been mentioned, so has water, and quite a number of other important local government services have also been mentioned during this Debate. We cannot wait for a great, fundamental change in local government structure before we deal with town planning. If we have 20 years' development in this country similar to that which took place after the last war no town planning Bills will be of any use at all, because the country will be irretrievably ruined. The idea that we


can wait so that we can base town planning administration and operation on a wide regional basis is too absurd. In the circumstances, therefore, whether we like it or not, we have to adumbrate some kind of immediate policy, and I think that this is the only policy we can have at the moment. I know we do not like joint boards, and curiously enough not many speakers have referred to this aspect of the White Paper, but it is an exceedingly important one. I say to the Minister that if he is to make this solution of joint boards work, he will have to be very careful how he draws up their constitution, and what powers he gives to these joint boards. There has been a good deal of dissatisfaction in local government circles about the constitution and operation of joint boards.
Let me give one illustration to show to what absurd uses they can be put. I know a certain water board, the finances of which are contributed by three county boroughs, in proportion to their rateable value and other factors. This water board on one occasion wished to extend its gathering grounds so as to build a new reservoir, and it promoted a Bill in Parliament. One of the constituent authorities on the board did not like the Bill and opposed it, and this was the Gilbertian position that resulted: a big county borough which provided part of the funds to promote the Bill also provided other money to oppose it. I do not want these boards to operate on those lines.
Then, again, to take the case of catchment boards, there was an instance in which the county boroughs in the area of a certain catchment board contributed the greater part of its finances. Yet the county councils on that particular board had the right and power to outvote them in matters of finance. Here again, great care requires to be exercised to see that we do not arrange the constitution and powers of these boards which will create positions like that, because that will only create bitterness, hostility and difficulty. Having said that, I think that joint boards must be the exception rather than the rule. The great structure of local government will be there, with modifications of course—I will say a word about the Boundary Commission in a moment—but the structure will be left intact to a large extent, with the addition that the ad-

ministration of some services will be exercised by a system of joint boards, which I think might do very well indeed, if the Government are very careful about their constitution. In any case, the joint boards will be operating for important functions. They will be dealing with very important services—education, town planning, water, and other things—and it may be that the very importance of the functions will generate in local government, and in joint boards generally, a more enthusiastic interest than has hitherto been displayed by joint boards.

Mr. Messer: If it is true that a population of 500 will be the minimum for a public health service, will not nearly all the authorities have to be joint boards for the public health services? Consequently, they will not be the exception, but the general rule.

Mr. Marshall: They may be the general rule for health services only, but I am considering the general services, of course. The Boundary Commission seems to me to have the makings of a very valuable instrument. We know the difficulties, the hostilities, and the rows that have been caused by attempts to enlarge boundaries. The local government structure has been crying out for a very long time for a boundary commission of this character. It will appease the hostility, and it may be that as time goes on it will bring about a more symmetrical structure in local government. At any rate, it will bind up the loose ends and remedy the defects that the hon. and learned Member for Montgomery (Mr. C. Davies) has talked about. I think it is one of the best suggestions in the White Paper.
I notice that there are special powers to deal with London. I am very pleased about that, because London is not local government, as I understand local government. London is a State within a State. You cannot have great power, such as London possesses, operated over one-fifth of the population of the land, and call it local government. The London problem seems to me to be almost insoluble, and I do not think there is anything in this White Paper which will solve it. My hon. Friend the Member for Peckham (Mr. Silkin) may get a vista so that one may see the towering majesty of St. Paul's from the Thames; he may get wide thoroughfares, he may get circu-


lar roads, but these are all decorative things. His chief problems will remain unsolved. In the last 20 years we could have created 10 towns of 200,000 inhabitants each out of the additional population that has come to London. I cannot see any kind of local government solution for a problem like that. If development is allowed to go on as it has gone on, during the last generation, we shall see London sprawling down to the coast, and there is no help for it. London is not town planning, it is not local government. It is a special problem, and I am glad the Minister is taking steps to deal with it as a special problem.
The Minister may be charged with taking the line of least resistance, with refusing to face the implications of the vital social changes foreshadowed in the reconstruction period, and with neglecting to perfect his machinery to carry the stress and strain of these changes. We shall look at this matter from different aspects, but I think the right hon. and learned Gentleman has produced a workable scheme, which will retain all that is best in the present structure and provide for the gradual improvement of its less efficient parts. There will rest upon the local authorities of this country a huge responsibility to live up to the great trust and make the scheme work. The opportunity will be in their strong hands to do a great work for this country, a work which will immeasurably enhance their long roll of achievements.

3.6 p.m.

Mr. Ralph Etherton: I am glad of this opportunity of making a few observations on this very important topic of local government. I welcome the White Paper, both for the manner in which the proposals are presented and for the proposals, in general, themselves. I listened with very great interest to the remarks of my hon. Friend the Member for Brightside (Mr. Marshall), because I believe that what he said reflected the feelings on this matter of those on this side of the House, in much the same way as I hope that what is being said on this subject on this side of the House reflects opinion on the other side. There is a unanimity about the feelings of Members on this White Paper which I find very pleasing. There are in the White Paper sound proposals, dealing with what is, admittedly, a complex problem, and I

believe that you can make progress in local government only if you carry with you the local authorities concerned. That is what I believe this White Paper has successfully done. Certainly, I know that, in general, the proposals find acceptance with the Association of Non-County Boroughs, and also with the Association of Urban District Councils, of both of which associations I happen to be a vice-president.
I am glad that the Government have decided to make no fundamental alteration in the structure of local government at present, and that they have come to the conclusion that at the present stage that is not necessary. But I hope that that does not exclude the necessity for drastic and major developments in proper time. I am glad that the Minister said that, in his view, the tendency towards regionalisation had gone. After all, that would have only put a buffer, or an additional tier, between the local authorities and Whitehall. The advantages which local government in its present structure have been able to enjoy have been illustrated by the advantage which they have had in the direct approach to the Civil Service in Whitehall and in particular to members of my right hon. Friend's Department. I know that local authorities are unanimous in their dislike of regionalisation. As the White Paper points out, and as my hon. Friend the Member for Bright-side has said, there are ample provisions in the White Paper proposals for action by local authorities through joint boards. I believe that there is useful work for joint boards to do in future. I know that in some quarters they have not always been popular authorities, but I believe that if the Boundary Commission makes the right type of recommendation, perhaps for all-purpose joint boards, and if it has the power to make recommendations which can be implemented, a great deal can be done through joint boards.
I want to ask the Minister who is to reply to the Debate, whether it is contemplated that the Commission will be able to take some step which will be effective to ensure that, where it is advisable, an effective joint board if necessary of an all-purpose type can be set up, and just what is contemplated in that regard. And I would like to ask a second question on this matter of joint boards for the larger authorities. What is it contemplated the Commission can do to effect


some progressive step in areas such as Merseyside, Tyneside and the Black Country? I know Merseyside well; indeed, I once contested a constituency in that part of the country, and I believe that some type of authority for all Merseyside is overdue. I know all the difficulties, but I still believe that it is an area where an all-embracing authority of some kind, not necessarily like the London County Council, but of that sort of nature, could do useful, progressive and effective work.
There is one tendency in the White Paper which I hope will be curbed. That is the tendency towards decentralisation of the Civil Service, and the setting up of branch or regional offices. That is referred to on page 5. I hope that that tendency is not of a very serious nature. I fully realise the necessity for a regional or branch office, say, of the Ministry of Labour or for an authority such as that, but I hope the tendency, if there is such a tendency, to decentralise my right hon. and learned Friend's Department will be resisted. I would like, if there is time, to receive in the reply which is to be given an indication of what is intended in regard to what is referred to in the White Paper as the future reorganisation of the fire service and of public utility services.
I want to say a word or two about the difficult problem of finance. I know that all local authorities will welcome the statement in the White Paper that a general overhaul of the financial relations between the Exchequer and the local authorities will be undertaken as soon as possible. Frankly, the present situation is both unfair and unsatisfactory to a great many local authorities. The balance of local finance has been wholly upset of recent years, and it has been upset in particular by re-rating. I do not think that the block grant, in its present set-up, is satisfactory either, and I know that my right hon. and learned Friend indicated that view in his speech. I believe that, if there is to be relief, as, no doubt, is necessary for agriculture, though I do not believe it is at the present time necessary for industry—and, while I am on that, may I say that it is most unfair that the relief from rates given to industry is not enjoyed by the local authority but passes to the Exchequer—it should be a national charge, and not a burden on the local authority. There is another matter

which I hope the Minister may be able to touch upon later, and that is the improvements which are contemplated by the adjustment of the machinery of assessment referred to in the White Paper.
Now a few words on the Boundary Commission itself. We all know that there is valuable work for it to do in correlating adjustments between counties and county areas on the one hand, and county boroughs on the other. It is a problem which we have never been able effectively to solve. There has always been expansion of county boroughs, on the one side, and the general resistance of the counties to any encroachment, on the other. This Boundary Commission can do most effective work in correlating the functions of these two authorities. I am not sure whether it is intended to have inspectors or assistant commissioners holding local government inquiries. If it is so intended, I hope that my right hon. and learned Friend's Department will think again about that. As a lawyer, it is repugnant to what I believe to be right, namely, that the person who holds the inquiry shall make the decision, and not that decisions shall be made by persons, who have not heard the evidence or seen the witnesses, merely on a Report. Therefore, I hope it will not be necessary for local government inquiries to be held by inspectors or by assistant commissioners.
I was glad to hear what my right hon. and learned Friend said in regard to the proposals for the general directions to the Boundary Commission. I would like to see those general directions embodied in the Bill. I know all the difficulties in regard to that. I know the arguments, or most of them, which could be put by my right hon. and learned Friend's Department against it. I know, for example, that these are matters which will take some time to consider. I know, too, that the general directions may neeed modification from time to time, but I still believe that it would be good, if it is practicable, to have the principal one in the Bill. I believe that the difficulties could be overcome, because I believe that this House will not, by the affirmative Resolution, have the control which I think it should have. The affirmative Resolution for dealing with these general directions will not, in my view, be satisfactory, for the reason that the House will not have any opportunity of altering


or modifying them; they will be put in a form in which we have to accept or reject them in toto, and I do not believe that, in most cases, the House will desire to do that. The House may desire to make some adjustments. I hope that a procedure will be devised which will enable the directions, or the broad ones, to be put in the Bill in such a way as will not preclude the House from being able to make adjustments from time to time.
There is one suggestion in the White Paper which I want to see dropped. I want to preserve the right of non-county boroughs to appeal to Parliament, as they have the right to-day by Section 146 (6) of the Local Government Act, 1933, and I do not believe that this Bill will be any the less a good Bill if that safeguard is continued. I was glad to hear what my right hon. and learned Friend said about his desire to preserve Royal Charters. If it is necessary to take away powers from authorities at present enjoying Royal Charters, I hope that that will only be done with the sanction of this House. I appreciate fully that there are cases where that is necessary, but I hope it will be done only with the approval of this House. There is one thing which the Minister said which I know will receive universal approval, and that was when he made clear what had been in doubt, in the minds of many local authorities, about the White Paper's reference to what would happen if alteration either in their status or boundaries is contemplated. I know that they will welcome the statement of my right hon. and learned Friend that it is not intended to alter the boundaries or status of any local authority without their consent save after a local inquiry. That will bring universal satisfaction.
A final word with regard to the directions to the Commission. I hope that effect will continue to be given to the recommendation of the Royal Commission which sat in 1922 and 1923 and made three reports, which covered several hundreds, indeed between them I think over a thousand pages, namely, that great regard should continue to be had to the wishes of the inhabitants of any particular area before an adjustment was made. I feel, too, that the old tendency which was always accepted—the tendency to regard it as the right of a

local authority to follow its overspill, will in future be regarded as obsolete. I welcome the White Paper and I look forward to the introduction of a Bill to give its proposals effect in due course.

3.22 p.m.

Sir Stanley Holmes: I think that a good many Members of this House served on a local body before they came here. I was one of those who, like my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary, had many years on the London County Council, and very valuable experience it was, too. Those of us who have served on a local body have found, in the first place, that for ever afterwards we were students of local government and have realised from time to time that, with the expanding and altering duties, change must take place in the structure. The White Paper has given us a lead. Previously reports embodying proposals for the reform of local government were published by the County Councils Association, the Association of Municipal Corporations, the Associations representing rural district councils and urban district councils and many others. Rarely has a public question been so thoroughly canvassed. The Labour Party has published its proposals and a committee of the Liberal National Party, under the chairmanship of Mr. J. B. Leaver, has issued a pamphlet styled "Local Government and its Future." I stress this because I shall make copious use of it in what I am going to say.
My hon. Friend the Member for Bright-side (Mr. Marshall) referred to the fact that we had had fifty years of local government. Local government in this country in its present form is the result of at least 100 years of evolution and adaptation. In many departments the growth has been one resulting from trial and error, but all the time new duties have been imposed, either by Parliament or by the local authority itself, in order to meet new needs. The result has been a structure which in many respects might be called untidy and even illogical. Nevertheless, while fully recognising that certain modifications designed to meet changing conditions are necessary, the present system, judged by results, is one of which it can be said that on the whole it is adequate for the tasks which it is called upon to perform and that it takes a proper place in our national life. Any local government


officer will bear testimony that within his own lifetime the character of local government functions has changed almost beyond recognition. The duties have changed. They have increased and become elaborated. Parliament has sometimes made financial contributions towards new duties imposed, and sometimes not. The result, although illogical, is British, and, like much else in British life, including the Constitution itself, is thoroughly flexible, plastic and workable, and one which has responded to increasing local public needs.
I will put forward an evident truth which, because it is so evident, is sometimes neglected. It is that local government, if it is worth while, must be local government and not government from Whitehall or from any other point so remote from the influence of the people in matters where local government most intimately touches the lives of the people. If fundamental changes are brought about in the structure of local government their only effect would be to remove from the people the control over their own affairs. Whatever gain there might be in efficiency—and that is a debatable point—is discounted by other and more far-reaching consequences. The services which local bodies administer must at all times and at all points be sensitive and responsive to the needs of the people of any particular locality, and such sensitiveness and responsiveness can only be secured by adhering to the localisation of those services; and by encouraging, because the work is responsible, the best men and women to take part in local affairs. The only qualification which should be added to that principle is that the country as a whole is rightly concerned to see that a relatively high service standard is maintained, that Exchequer grants are well spent, and that due co-ordination between authorities exists for the benefit of all. But these points can almost all be secured by a paternal and advisory attitude on the part of the central Government without any question of intervention in the local government field in a coercive or dictatorial way. It must also be agreed, in view of the many new and comprehensive services announced or under consideration by the Government, that our local government system must provide sufficient elasticity for expansion. It is satisfactory, therefore, to observe that the White Paper suggests no uprooting. Those

of us who do any gardening—and I suppose more of us do than was formerly the case—know that it is very dangerous to try to uproot tares for fear of uprooting very valuable fruit and flowers at the same time.

Mr. Hugh Lawson: Has the hon. Member not heard of root pruning?

Sir S. Holmes: I think that I might very well add that to what I am going to say. I am very much obliged to my hon. Friend for the suggestion. The White Paper, while suggesting no uprooting, certainly does not say that there is no need for some change, but not a fundamental change. Do all parties agree to this? There seems to have been a great deal of unanimity to-day with regard to this proposal, but it would not do us any harm if we considered for a few moments the proposals of the Labour Party embodied in a document entitled "The Future of Local Government," published in 1943. It would certainly seem, from what has been said to-day, that they have changed their opinion since 1943.

Mr. Messer: No, that is still the policy of the party, carried at their last Conference.

Sir S. Holmes: Then I am on good ground in discussing it. It appears from the pamphlet that the Labour Party realises the amount of feeling which exists against any tampering with local government in any way, unless a greater end is to be served, and this may account for some of the inconsistencies and confusion in this pamphlet which try to give a democratic veneer to proposals which are essentially authoritarian. Let me read what it says:
The Report says that the democratic position in local government must be preserved; yet it declares that there are too many local authorities. It does not, however, state by what number local authorities should be reduced, or in what types reduction should be made. If the reductions are to be drastic, they must result in weakening in many areas the control exercised by citizens over their local affairs.
The Report appears to take the view that there is too much permissive legislation. It may be pointed out that permissive legislation allows variations between one area and another; furthermore, the alternative to permissive legislation is mandatory legislation, which allows no voice to the locality as to operating the legislation or not.
The Report condemns regionalism, and yet proposes the setting up of regional authorities


with powers of delegation to smaller authorities. …
The Report envisages a set-up of local government in which one authority (the 'Major Authority') will be a precepting authority and another (the 'Area Authority') will be a rating authority. Thus one authority would have every inducement to be spendthrift and the other to be parsimonious.
This scheme shows that the Labour Party desire that local government should not be local government at all, but Whitehall government, either by means of nationalisation of services now performed by localities or by the central Government, in the name of uniformity and efficiency, making local authorities their agents to a far greater extent than has obtained in the past. Local authorities would then become only the local executive of whatever Government was in power, to the sapping of local initiative and responsibility, and would take their political complexion necessarily from such a Government. With an authoritarian central Government, its domination would extend immediately over every local authority in the country, and its will would be imposed universally, whatever local desires might be. If this is thought to be a fanciful picture, reference may be made to a book entitled "Problems of a Socialist Government" published a few years before the war.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Major Milner): This Debate is about the Government's White Paper on Local Government. The hon. Gentleman is quoting from other documents which appear to have little or no relation to the Government White Paper.

Sir S. Holmes: I was going to quote the Minister of Aircraft Production, and the Deputy Prime Minister's writings on this particular subject, particularly on the subject of regionalism, which I thought was in Order.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: If the hon. Gentleman brings what he has to say into relation to the Government's White Paper he may be in Order, otherwise I am very doubtful whether he is.

Sir S. Holmes: I think I can do it in this particular way, that one would assume that a White Paper placed before the House by the Government had the consent of all the Ministers. What I

want to quote quite briefly is something that has been said, first by the Minister of Aircraft Production and secondly by the Deputy Prime Minister, on the question of regional government, which the White Paper throws over, and I want to ask if all the Ministers agree to that, because the Minister of Aircraft Production said this:
Another means that has been adopted for getting rid of congestion in Parliament is the delegation of power to local authorities. This method is satisfactory provided the local authorities are willing and capable, but it is necessary to retain some measure of central control to ensure that the delegated powers are fully and properly exercised, more especially while the political complexion of certain local authorities is different from that of the Central Government. … It is, however, of the first importance that the whole conception of Local Government responsibility should be revised. A larger unit will be required, acting in more direct consultation with the central authority and with the widest administrative powers in its own area. Regional councils having such powers and functions must form a most important link in the Socialist scheme if Socialism is to be more than a name. It will not only be necessary for the Central Government to pass Socialist measures, but it will be necessary to have Socialist Region Councils to see that they are carried through promptly and efficiently.

Mr. Lipson: Could my hon. Friend give us the date of that quotation and say whether it was written before the Minister joined the Government? It is just possible that he may have changed his views since then.

Sir S. Holmes: It was certainly published before the war.

Mr. Burden: What is the relationship between that statement and this Debate?

Sir S. Holmes: It is a book called "Problems of a Socialist Government."

Mr. Messer: What has it to do with the White Paper?

Sir S. Holmes: My hon. Friend behind me objects to my giving it advertisement, but I do not think it matters. The Deputy Prime Minister put forward a scheme which may be read in full by my hon. Friend opposite. His scheme includes not only regional commissioners but also district commissioners.

Mr. G. Strauss: What date is this one?

Sir S. Holmes: Just before the war. The Deputy Prime Minister, describing the district commissioner, says:
He is the local energiser and interpreter of the will of the Government. He is not impartial. He is a Socialist, and therefore in touch with the Socialists in the region, who are his colleagues in his campaign.
It may be, as has been suggested by my hon. Friend the Member for Cheltenham (Mr. Lipson), that the Socialist Ministers who are now in the Government have entirely changed the views they held prior to the war, and that all this idea of regionalism and so on has been given up.

Dr. Russell Thomas: Leopards never change their spots.

Sir S. Holmes: If what I have said is so, I would like to hear more about it. Although I cannot hold the Home Secretary responsible for the views of the Minister of Aircraft Production perhaps he will tell us something about it. Can he tell us what is to be the future of the National Fire Service?

Mr. Messer: What is to be the future of the National Liberal Party?

Mr. H. Morrison: Can my hon. Friend the Member for Harwich (Sir S. Holmes) say whether his question is intended to be helpful?

Sir S. Holmes: I am quite sure that if, in 1937 or 1938, a proposal had been put forward to take over the London Fire Brigade—

Mr. Speaker: The London Fire Brigade and the National Fire Service are not concerned with the White Paper we are discussing, and the hon. Member is, therefore, out of Order in referring to them.

Sir S. Holmes: With great respect, Sir, the National Fire Service must come within the provisions of the White Paper.

Mr. Speaker: It is not in the White Paper.

Sir S. Holmes: Then if it is not in Order I cannot continue to discuss it—

Mr. Speaker: I am sorry. I understand that there is a passing reference to it, but, even so, this is not the occasion on which to discuss the National Fire Service.

Sir S. Holmes: Then all I have to say in conclusion is that Burke once wrote:
A disposition to preserve, and ability to improve, taken together, must be my standard of a statesman.

I think that that can well apply to local authorities, and that if, as a result of this White Paper, they are able so to improve themselves as to be able to take their proper place in the life of this country, with the best men and women serving upon them, this House will have done good work.

3.44 p.m.

Mr. Messer: The Minister of Health must be a very happy man to-day, because he has heard from every side, from representatives of all parties, nothing but praise of his White Paper. I am not surprised. A long time ago various associations discussed the reform of local government. The County Councils' Association produced a report, as did the Rural Councils' Association and the Association of Municipal Corporations, and all said, in effect: "Let us have reform of local government, but for goodness' sake do not touch us." We have heard that in the House to-day. Everybody realises that there is need for improvement in the machinery of local government, but nobody wants to surrender any power.

Sir Percy Hurd: May I remind my hon. Friend that the Rural District Councils' Association advocated the appointment of just such a Commission as is described in the White Paper?

Mr. Messer: Yes, but not because they wanted to surrender any power. I am referring to the reform of local government. All the White Paper does is to say that there shall be set up a Boundary Commission, but that will not reform local government. It will touch the fringe of the problem, but it will not face up to it altogether. I am not blaming the Minister for that, because I realise that one must be a courageous Minister to tackle the job, and, further, I am not so sure that one ought not to aim at getting as much as possible by agreement at the present time and then embark on the big plan. How should we approach this matter? First, we should recognise that there are certain services which have to be administered. Broadly speaking, those services can be divided into two types. There is the type of service which might be termed impersonal, in that it affects the community in the aggregate rather than individually. It includes the mechanistic services, such as the supply of electricity. I do not care who administers electricity


so long as it can be carried into every house in the country. It does not matter very much to me whether it is administered by a specially appointed ad hoc body or the State itself; providing it is efficiently managed and carried through with economy there is no need for it to be a matter of local administration. The same applies to gas, water, land drainage and things of that kind that do not touch the individual as such.
Then we come to what might be termed the purely human services—education, health, maternity, child welfare and care of the mentally afflicted. Here we face a problem that must be resolved. We must recognise that to get efficiency it may be necessary to have a large unit, but if we do then there is the danger that that unit may be too far removed from the people. I submit that it is not what we do that matters, but the way in which we do it. Local administration of all these human services is better because of the way they are administered. I have seen boards of guardians in the old days, which were responsible for the administration of outdoor relief, doing their job in such a way that it was humiliating to the recipient. I have seen others who have been humane and have done their job in such a way that the recipient has not felt any humiliation at having to claim poor relief. It is important that we should secure that in the administration of these services there shall be some means whereby part of the administration shall be vested in the hands of those nearest to the recipients of the services.
How are we to administer health services? If we are to have health services which are to be efficient, and deal with every aspect of health matters, we must not only place emphasis on the remedial side but on the restorative and rehabilitation sides. Take the present powers of local authorities. At the moment they can spend millions of pounds on building sanatoria for tuberculosis, and draw their patients from the slums, but they have no power to build houses for those patients afterwards; they have to send them back to the slums. Attention must be paid to that. How are we to resolve the apparent contradiction of the large unit, a unit with a population ranging between 500,000 and 2,000,000, which could administer all the health service required for those people? We cannot get a unit covering a popula-

tion of 500,000 close enough to the people to ensure that the service will be administered not merely efficiently but humanely, but it can decide the general policy. It can plan the service for that area. It can decide that there shall be a standard of service which must be observed and it can both delegate, and can be compelled by Statute to delegate, certain powers of administration to a smaller unit within the area. That is going to resolve the problem. It is going to give to a large enough body power to lay down the policy and give those nearest the health centre the job of administration. When hon. Members refer to the divorcing of elected representatives from the people who elect them, that is not necessarily the case. This thing has to be regarded first from the standpoint of science. We want a little more study in sociology. This has to be considered from the human aspect.
Look at the position to-day. The hon. Member who preceded me was wide of the mark in much that he said. Everyone has been patting himself on the back. Rural district councils do their job well and efficiently, but county borough councils are the ideal. They are an all-purpose authority. The county councils speak in glowing terms of what they do. The truth is that probably each does its best within the limits of its capacity. Middlesex, with a population of 2,000,000, can raise £84,000 with a penny rate. The administrative county of Lancashire, with approximately a population of 2,000,000, raises £40,000 by a penny rate. The amount produced per head of the population is half as much in Lancashire as in Middlesex. Can we expect the same standard of service in Lancashire as in Middlesex? Clearly not, and it is as well for us to understand that, when the Government have placed duties and responsibilities on the shoulders of local authorities, they have not always been accompanied by the means to carry out those duties. I am making all allowance for the block grant. What is wrong is that there has been such wide variation in the administration of it. It is wrong that there should be counties which have no tuberculosis service. Our job surely is to determine the service that has to be administered and then to create an efficient machine to administer it.
Anyone can see that we shall not be able to have these expanded social services that we want unless we do one of


two things: reform local government so that it will be able to carry it out, or have a number of joint bodies. These are not good, and not popular. People speak in praise of them because, if a local authority can prevent itself going out of existence by having a joint board, it will be in favour of a joint board. But some of us remember the fight over the abolition of the Metropolitan Asylums Board and we saw that, when the London County Council took it over, it was administered not merely as efficiently but with greater efficiency and with a greater degree of humanity. Joint boards are unrepresentative. What is more totalitarian than a joint board elected from a number of local authorities? It never reports back to the local authorities. When does a local authority ever get a report from the Metropolitan Water Board or the delegates it sends to it? What voice do they have in the determination of policy? Joint boards spend money and lay the burden of finding it on their constituent parts. The old Liberal principle of no taxation without representation does not apply to them.
I look with some fear on the possibility of finally having a system of local government which will consist of a series of unilateral, special ad hoc bodies, and that would not be a good thing. One can look round and see the need for this Boundary Commission. It will have a very important job to do, but it will not do for us who are pleading for improved social services to imagine that this is the last word. Clearly finance, too, will have to receive consideration. If I am the only one who is not following the example that has been set me of praising the present local authorities, if I appear to have been critical, let me say that they have done their best within the limits of their capacity, but they have not all had the same opportunity. Those who have had the opportunity have done better work, because the chance has been there for them to do it. I hope we shall see, as a result of this Boundary Commission, reports which will indicate the need for the reform of local government.

Sir Harold Webbe: It is a privilege and, indeed, a great responsibility to follow the hon. Member for South Tottenham (Mr. Messer) in the speech which he has just

made. He speaks, as we all know, with deep knowledge and wide experience, but, what is more important, he brings to discussions of this kind a realism and a human approach which make his speeches even more interesting and more important than they might be simply from his knowledge and experience. I listened with great interest and with much approval to what the hon. Member said, and I shall inevitably find myself referring to him and enlisting his support in much that I have to say. I want at the outset to join all those who, except the hon. and learned Member for Montgomery (Mr. C. Davies), have welcomed the White Paper and congratulated my right hon. and learned Friend on the very clear and common sense speech with which he introduced it.
The White Paper is certainly by no means premature. For many years past the burden upon the local authorities has changed in character and grown in size so much that we have obviously to consider whether the machinery as it now exists, and has existed for years, is still the best we can have to face the new conditions. This is made all the more essential by the fact that the reconstruction programme which is being unfolded in White Papers and new legislation must inevitably bring about further profound changes in the job which the local authorities have to do, and greatly add to the heavy burden with which they are already charged. We are, therefore, glad to know from the White Paper that the Government have under serious consideration the need for adapting, modifying and examining the local government machinery in the light of the work which faces it in the next few years. It is true that, judging from the White Paper, the consideration that has been given has not so far led to very much in the way of positive proposals. I do not think there is any reason to complain on that score. The whole problem is so complex and, indeed, is so vital to the future administration of the great social and other services of this country, that it is obviously better—and we are grateful to the Government that they should, as we know they have, consult the local authorities themselves, and, as they are doing to-day, consult this House before they introduce drastic changes in the structure of the local government machine.
There is one proposal on which I should like to say a word or two—the proposal to set up a Boundary Commission. I have no doubt of the need for a piece of machinery of this kind. Movements of population and changing conditions during the last 30 and 40 years have already made changes in the boundaries and status of many local authorities not only justifiable but essential for the efficient management of their affairs. With increased activity in the fields of town planning, location of industry, the planned spreading of employment, and so on, these changes will become more marked and the need for adjustment will become more obvious. Therefore, I welcome the appointment of the Boundary Commission. At the same time, I would like to comment a little on the way in which it is intended the Commission should work. It is to work under general directions issued by the Minister, and those directions are to be laid before Parliament. Among those directions is one on page 13 under the heading of "Linking town and country." Quite frankly, I do not like those proposals at all. It would be well and good if they were limited to the kind of case to which my right hon. and learned Friend referred—Welshpool, Leominster, Tiverton and towns which are so small that they are little more than villages and which have all the characteristics of the countryside and all the interests and understanding of the countryside. Nothing but good can come of extending the authority of towns such as that.
But the proposal appears to go much further, and I am certain that any suggestion that, as a matter of policy, the urbanised areas within the rural counties should be encouraged to seek to spread into the surrounding country will raise a pretty considerable storm in the countryside. I am very doubtful as to its wisdom. I am not concerned with the immediate and obvious difficulty that, if the towns encroach too much on the country, the counties themselves may become unworkable units. I am more concerned with the kind of difficulty which is hinted at in the White Paper. The Paper refers to the difficulty of obtaining a suitable composition for the local authority which should manage the affairs of this kind of two-piece area. I believe that it is much more than a question of adjust-

ing the times of meeting, as is suggested in the White Paper. Is it not a fact that, in nearly all these urban areas in rural counties, the local authorities, the town councils or borough councils tend to be dominated by the townsman trader and business man, and even the town professional man, who has not a very great understanding of the countryman's point of view, and often very little sympathy with it? I cannot believe that to place the affairs of the countryside in the hands of authorities of that kind will be in the interests of either.
The normal story of extensions of this kind has been one of rising rates to pay for improvements in the town which the countryman can never enjoy. My right hon. and learned Friend gave some figures of rates in rural areas and country towns, but I am sure he knows better than anyone in the House how fallacious it is to deal with averages. I am certain that, if one takes actual cases, one finds that the countryside is milked to provide town improvements. Moreover, the townsman insists on the countryman having all sorts of things which he regards as desirable amenities, but which the countryman does not want, and certainly does not need. I have seen within my own experience a perfect outbreak on ordinary country roads of curbed and paved sidewalks, and road signs, and proposals for quite unnecessary drainage schemes, street lighting and all sorts of things which the countryman not only does not need, but strongly objects to having but which the townsman in his wisdom has provided for him. The countryman does not mind whether he has mud on his boots. There is a danger that the country will be swamped by the townsman's point of view. The countryman is much safer in the hands of the county council than in the hands of the county town.
The second thing in regard to the Boundary Commission to which no one has so far referred, I think, is the control or oversight which Parliament is to have over their work, As I understand the White Paper, it is intended that proposals which affect the boundaries of counties and county boroughs shall require the approval of Parliament, but that in every other case a recommendation or decision of a Boundary Commission shall be binding. Both in principle and in practice that is bad. We appoint far too many of these


outside bodies—and we have done so particularly in the last few years—with absolute power, not answerable to the control of Parliament or to the courts of justice. We should not add to their number. If there is to be any alteration, I hope it will be in the direction of giving greater control by Parliament over the work of bodies like these, rather than less. So much for the Boundary Commission.
Now I would like to make one or two remarks on the earlier part of the White Paper, on what one might fairly call the general observations on the whole subject of the structure of local government. It is true that those observations do not lead to any specific conclusion, but they do at least indicate the attitude of mind of the Government in relation to these problems. I do not think that anyone, except perhaps the hon. and learned Member for Montgomery: not even the hon. Member for South Tottenham (Mr. Messer), will disagree with the principle which the Government enunciated that a fundamental alteration of the structure of local government is not at the present time either necessary or desirable. I accept much of what the hon. Member for South Tottenham said about the need for looking at the basic structure of local government and of considering whether it requires modification, but I would remind him that the Minister himself has made it perfectly clear that the White Paper is concerned not with the whole future but with the immediate post-war years. It is concerned with what we should do to enable the machine we have to meet the sudden strains of the reconstruction period. It does not, in any sense, bar out basic changes in the structure of local government at a later stage.
As to the wisdom of doing the best we can with the machinery we have, there can, I think, be no doubt. I am not at all sure that the analogy of the hon. and learned Member for Montgomery of putting the cart before the horse is sound. I would rather think in terms of creating a new product in an industrial establishment. I think a manufacturer would be wise first to get clear in his own mind the nature of the product he wants to produce and then to try it out with such machinery as he has in his factory. When he is satisfied as to exactly what he wants, then he can build the special purpose machinery to do the job. I conceive that

it is much that attitude of mind which the White Paper represents. This is, in a sense, a temporary arrangement of an experimental character in order to gain experience and find out what is ultimately necessary.
Nor, I am sure, would anyone disagree with the purpose of the Government to strengthen the framework of local government to bear greater responsibilities and fulfil new tasks, and to secure an organisation which, by its fitness for its purpose, will attract administrators of the right type and give them proper scope. There has been considerable reference to the great importance of securing the right personnel in local government. I suggest that that question is very closely linked with the structure and the allocation of functions between local government bodies. If we overload the major authorities with administrative work, as there is a temptation to do in these days, a position is created in which we can only look for administrators of the ideal type among, at any rate so far as young people are concerned, the leisured or professional classes the ordering of whose time is very largely within their control. If we give the great authorities too much to do we shall not get the right type of recruit. Equally, if we give the smaller authorities too little to do, we shall not make them attractive to the right type of people. There is no doubt whatever, although I can only speak with personal experience of London, that while the county councils find difficulty in getting the right type of persons to become members because there is too much to do, the borough councils are finding equal difficulty in attracting the right type because they have too little to do that is worth while. Therefore, I. submit that the question of personnel cannot be thought out without relation to the allocation of functions as between the various authorities.
There is common ground also, I am sure, as to the necessity of co-ordinating many of the things which are already the responsibility of the local authorities, in view of the likelihood that many other responsibilities will be placed upon those authorities in the future. No doubt we shall have to plan, to co-ordinate and to standardise quality in a number of services over areas substantially bigger than those which the present major local authorities control. It is when we come to the suggestions in the White Paper for


a solution of that problem that I confess myself a little worried. There are three solutions discussed. The first is the creation of the great all-purpose, directly-elected, regional authority. I am glad to say that that suggestion is dismissed. I am convinced that authorities of that kind are far too big for effective administration. They become purely bureaucratic machines, the members of which are able to do very little more than rubber stamp the recommendations of their officials. Moreover, I am sure that we have quite enough elections, and that the electors do not want the business of electing yet another type of authority every two or three years.
The other suggestions which are seriously considered are joint boards and joint committees, the distinction between which has not been made very clear in to-day's Debate. They are both to be indirectly elected bodies, but the joint board is to be armed with executive powers, precepting on its constituent authorities for the wherewithal to discharge its functions, whereas the joint committee would have the function of planning, co-ordinating, and standardising but would have no executive authority or responsibility whatever. I am sorry to see, on reading the White Paper dispassionately, that it looks as though the mind of the Government goes very much in the direction of the joint boards. I am glad that the hon. Member for South Tottenham spoke as strongly as he did about them. I do not like them at all. Indeed, I believe that to set out on a policy of creating a large number of single-purpose, indirectly elected—which makes it even worse—precepting authorities, to administer individual services, is definitely a step quite in the wrong direction. It is undoing all that we have tried to do in the last 50 years. The whole effort in the field of local government has been to get rid of these single-purpose authorities, to get rid of the school boards, the guardians, the Metropolitan Asylums Board, and any number of others, and it is just to the extent that we have succeeded in bringing all the services within the ambit and purview of one elected body, that we have had success in the business of local government. I believe that the case for the compendious—a horrid but common name —all-purpose local authority is unanswerable. In no other way can we secure the

proper balanced development Of the various services for which local government is responsible.
But these all-purpose authorities must not be too big. Otherwise, we get to the regional authority, which the Government have, I think rightly, rejected. It seems to me that we are driven back for our coordination on the joint committee. We cannot discuss that arrangement, as the White Paper does, by saying that it is unsatisfactory—I think the words are that it is unsatisfactory to divorce planning of this type from executive authority. Surely that is manifestly untrue. Indeed, I hope it is. Some months ago this House spent a considerable time in passing a great Education Act. What is that Act but a plan for the national education service, a laying-down of lines of organisation, a prescribing of standards of educational provision? Is it unsatisfactory that that great plan should be administered, not by the Ministry of Education, but by the local education authorities; surely not? That has never been suggested, but if this principle is satisfactory at the highest level, why should it suddenly become unsatisfactory a little lower down?
Why could not joint committees plan, lay down standards, co-ordinate and prepare a scheme for a large area, which, after submission to the appropriate Minister, would become the official scheme and would be carried out by the ordinary executive authorities who are already within that area? If it is necessary that a big stick should be used to compel these constituent authorities to do their job according to the plan, is it not better that that big stick should be in the hands of a Minister of the Crown, responsible to Parliament, rather than in the hands of a joint board which, as the hon. Member for South Tottenham said, is responsible to no one at all? It seems to me it is along those lines we can most hopefully look for this co-ordination and planning which has become necessary, and which will become increasingly necessary in the future. This can be done without disturbing that fundamental relationship between local authorities and Whitehall which is sacrosanct to all local authorities, the direct responsibility of the executive authority to Whitehall, without the intervention of anyone between them. That has been the complaint against the regional authorities—that they intervene between the authority which is


doing the job and the appropriate Government Department in Whitehall. The intervention of an advisory and planning committee is quite a different story, and I am certain that that cannot be summarily dismissed as a solution. I venture to submit it is a much more satisfactory solution that the wholesale creation of joint boards with executive powers.
On the matter of finance, which, it has been generally agreed, is fundamental and vital, the White Paper, if I may say so without disrespect, says really nothing at all. I am afraid that my right hon. and learned Friend was not able to lighten our darkness very much on that matter either, but the simple fact, on which I think we are all agreed, is that the whole business of assessment, of rating, of grants, of the allocation of expenditure as between rates and taxes, must be looked at afresh. The whole problem must be examined anew without any prejudice or any preconceived ideas. There is no doubt that, on the provision of adequate money, and still more important, on the proper allocation of that money, the rationing of that money, between various services, will depend, very largely, the success or failure of all these schemes which we pass with such enthusiasm and, as I am afraid I sometimes think, so light-heartedly. Everything must depend on proper arrangements for spreading the burden between the ratepayer and the taxpayer.
I cannot leave this subject without drawing attention to one sentence in the paragraph on local government finance, on page 6, in which it is stated:
… the increase in the general level of rates during the war has been small in comparison with the increase in national taxation …
My right hon. and learned Friend must have had his tongue very much in his cheek when he wrote that. It is too ingenuous altogether. During the war the Government have been practically the sole customers for the whole of British industry, and have paid direct 100 per cent. grants for a very big part of the activities of local authorities—Civil Defence and other specialised activities. It is not surprising that the taxpayers have had a fat bill to meet. In time of war the level of rates and the level of taxation are not susceptible of any comparison whatever. No argument in regard to local authority finances can be based on

what I would venture to call so meaningless a sentence.
I would like to speak briefly about London. As one who has now had some 20 years' experience of local government in London, I welcome the recognition which the Government show in the White Paper that London has problems which are entirely its own. I, therefore, very much welcome the appointment which is foreshadowed of some authoritative body to consider these problems and to try to find a solution. I am more than glad that the question of Greater London is to be excluded from their consideration. I agree with one hon. Member, I think it was the hon. Member for Brightside (Mr. Marshall), that there are enough immediate problems to be dealt with in London—the boundaries of the boroughs, and particularly the allocation of duties between the counties and the boroughs—to keep us occupied for some time to come, without asking for more. That is particularly so in regard to this question of the allocation of duties. For the reason to which I referred a few moments ago, the necessity for attracting the right type of administrator, we must look carefully at this allocation of duties. In my opinion, the general tendency and desire should be to pass more back to the boroughs, away from the county. I congratulate the Minister and wish him success in dealing with this great new burden which has been added to his already heavy load.

4.29 p.m.

Mr. Burden: I welcome this Debate and the White Paper. Everyone will agree that with over 10,000 separate local authorities, ranging from the tiny parish meetings to the great county boroughs and counties, there is a case for reform and adjustment. But I welcome the Government's proposals in the White Paper, because I believe that with the constitution of a permanent Boundary Commission it will be possible to obtain quite a number of these necessary adjustments by agreement. I know there are plenty of people who have produced ideal forms of local government on paper —quite logical, quite tidy, all fitting in one part with another. The only trifling defect of schemes of that kind is that they will not work. It is also necessary to say that we welcome the Government's statement that the financial structure, as between the local authorities and the State, needs adjusting. We welcome the


statement of the Minister in that direction. It will want very careful study, and perhaps some development, in view of the duties which are being placed on local authorities.
But, important as those two problems are—and no one can overstate their importance—I welcome the reference which the Minister made to the importance of the personnel of the local government service. In view of the ever-increasing complexity and diversity of services which the State is constantly passing on to local authorities, I suggest that the problem of their recruitment and training, and their salary standards, is of prime importance to us when considering the reform of local government. Local government supplies the nation with a whole range of services, from the essential needs of a civilised life to some of the highest forms of culture. We must very carefully watch their development, and endeavour to improve the local government services. The Royal Commission on Local Government, which reported in 1928, devoted a good deal of time to that question. The published evidence has a wealth of information, and, it is only fair to say, many diverse views from different persons and organisations. But the final Report of the Commission states that it is open to question whether the present methods of recruitment of local government officers are calculated to ensure that local authorities have at their disposal officers of the type needed to assist them in the discharge of the increasing responsibilities which Parliament is year by year laying upon them, and, as the Minister indicated, as a result of a suggestion by the Royal Commission, what is popularly known as the Hadow Committee was appointed, to review the whole problem of recruitment, training, salaries, and other similar matters.
That Committee reported in 1934. It is true that one of the recommendations, that there should be a Central Advisory Committee to deal with these problems, did not commend itself to the organisations responsible, nor does the Phillimore Committee, which is, I presume, still in being, commend itself to those bodies. Two years after the issue of the Hadow Committee's Report the Ministry sent a circular to local authorities, dealing with the recommendations of the Committee.
If the House will allow me, I Would like to quote a few sentences from the circular. It says:
It will be clear to local authorities that the increasing importance and complexity of their work make it year by year more necessary to increase the efficiency and improve the organisation of their staffs. The authoritative character of the Committee, with which the associations of Local Authorities and the principal associations of their officials were represented, makes it his duty"—
that is, the Minister's duty—
to urge that the most careful consideration to the Committee's conclusion shall be given.
That was in 1936. So far as I know, no action has been taken by the Ministry since that date. I wonder whether the Minister or the Department knows how many local authorities have carried out the suggestions in that Report, or given careful consideration to the findings of the Hadow Committee. Since that date, fortunately for local government, the Association of Local Authorities and the National Association of Local Government Officers, which is the appropriate organisation for dealing with the question of recruitment, pay, and status of local government officers, have taken joint action.
As the Minister stated, the National Joint Council for the clerical, professional and other grades of local authorities has been reconstituted. On the employers' side it is made up of 15 representatives from the provincial Whitley Councils and representatives from the local authorities' associations, in ratio to their strength, and on the employees' side there is a majority of representatives of the National Association of Local Government Officers. For some time this National Joint Council has had before it what might be properly described as a charter for the local government services, and this is now under consideration by the employers' side. But if the work of the National Joint Council and the local Whitley Councils is to have any real value the recommendations of these bodies in relation to local authorities must be placed on a better and a firm foundation. The National Joint Council should be, in the words of its constitution, charged with the supervision of all questions affecting officers of local authorities from a national point of view. Some of the provincial councils have had a very long experience of dealing with these problems of recruitment,


status, and so on. One or two so long as 24 years ago produced schemes dealing with those questions.
But, while quite a good deal has been accomplished by the provincial councils, much remains to be done. There are still many local authorities who do not accept and put into operation the findings of the Whitley Councils. Some 14 years ago, Dr. Robson, who gave evidence before the Royal Commission, amplified his evidence and stated that there were still a large number of authorities who failed to correlate entrance into the local government service with the various types of national education or tap the reservoir of mental ability which is, to a great extent, concentrated in the universities. He added that patronage existed, in the main, among the smaller authorities, and that local councils had contributed very little towards the task of building up a municipal civil service and turning that service into a municipal civil service from a mere job or occupation. I agree that, in some respects, the position has improved since that date, but I submit that, while there are a number of councils who do not accept or apply the findings agreed to at Whitley Councils, national and local difficulties are bound to be encountered and that the time is ripe for a co-ordination and extension of the Joint Council and the local Whitley Councils on national lines.
I mentioned a moment or two ago that the staff side of the National Joint Council had submitted a scheme for the consideration of the employing side. This scheme naturally falls into four parts. The first lays down Regulations regarding qualifications, recruitment, training, the appointment of juniors at a minimum age, examination qualifications, combination of authorities for examination purposes, admission of higher age groups, university graduates, articled pupils, mobility within the service, post-entry training facilities and financial assistance. Secondly, it prescribes general conditions of service, such as office hours, annual leave, sickness regulations, security of tenure and similar conditions. The third part is of equal importance. It deals with the relationship which should exist under proper conditions between officers and members of local authorities. It courageously faces the problem of the employment of relatives of councillors, and the canvassing of members of local authori-

ties. In short, it lays down a code of conduct for both the councillor and the employee. Fourthly, it formulates a national scale of salaries for juniors, general clerical staffs, and the administrative, professional and technical grades and the operation of the scales and inducements for those in the professional and technical groups to qualify themselves by studying for the appropriate technical and professional examinations.
The National Joint Council has the advantage, not only of the skilled and detailed knowledge brought to it by the employers' representatives, but the accumulated experience of the National Association of Local Government Officers, which, as we all know, includes in its membership people from the town clerk, with his salary of £2,000 to £3,000 per annum, right down to the junior clerk in the office, and, at the present time, I understand that it has a membership of over 120,000. I do, however, submit to the House that the problem of the local government service is a most urgent one and that the recommendations of 'the Royal Commission on Local Government ought to be carried out. I ask the Minister to round off the work of the Wages Councils Bill by giving, in some form or other, legislative sanction to functions of the National Joint Council. There is precedent for this in the Railways Act of 1921, which provided appropriate negotiating machinery for all sections of the railway staffs.
There are also questions arising from the immediate war situation, questions of reinstatement and rehabilitation. Men and women who have been away from the service for five or six years have, naturally, lost touch with current difficulties and problems. The National Joint Council is planning ahead, and I think it is vitally important that there should be facilities for attendance at refresher courses, with leave of absence without loss of pay. Training interrupted by service with the Forces should be taken up and completed, and adequate facilities should be given for it, and, above all, every junior officer in the local government service should be made to feel that it is his duty, in the interests of the service, to obtain the appropriate professional and technical qualifications. Parliament is imposing fresh responsibilities upon local councils. The development of town planning, the reconstruction


of blitzed and blighted cities, new roads, the development of education—all these call for the highest forms of service from the local government staffs. For some six years, the intake of universities and technical schools has been greatly reduced, if not entirely suspended, and the National Joint Council, with wisdom and foresight, is endeavouring to induce local authorities to co-operate with the Minister of Labour's Committee on Further Education in order that those who have served in the Forces should make up for time lost while they have been away.
I hope the Minister will take these very urgent problems of the local government service into consideration, either by administrative action now or in the new legislative set-up that should, in due course, arise from the White Paper and this Debate.

4.48 p.m.

Sir Ralph Glyn: I am sure that all of us who are in touch with local government in one way or another, support the remarks that have fallen from my hon. Friend who has just spoken. It is absolutely essential that the status of local government officers should be improved, in proportion to the amount of extra work that is now devolving upon them. In connection with that, I do not know whether the Home Secretary could deal with this point, but, as regards the regions with which my right hon. Friend has had something to do in setting up Regional Commissioners, we found that the Whitehall office representatives made the regional headquarters also their own headquarters. Nobody to-day has said much about them. Throughout the war, since they have been established in the local areas, I have found them of the very greatest service. They have been of great assistance to the local authorities, and I should be very sorry indeed to see them disappear when the Regional Commissioners disappear.
The representatives of the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Works and of all the other Whitehall Departments were clustered round the right hon. Gentleman's Commissioners. The Commissioners had nothing to do as regards control of the representatives of the Whitehall Departments, but, as they were in a position to convene meetings, in a great many cases, the Commissioners invited Mem-

bers of Parliament for the area, and the officers of the various Whitehall Departments, to attend joint conferences which have been of the very greatest value. I do not know whether when the regional commissioners disappear it will be possible for the Minister of Health to convene such conferences but I suggest that the Minister might be asked to consider whether somebody could be appointed to take the place of the regional commissioners so that Members of Parliament and chairmen and clerks of local authorities can have an opportunity of getting into direct touch with representatives of the various Departments concerned with local government. I would like to say how completely I find myself in agreement with the hon. Member for South Tottenham (Mr. Messer), who has done yeoman service in this field of work and to whom the House always listens with the very greatest interest. The best and easiest division to make of local government work is the division that he made between the services that the locality has to provide for its citizens and the more homely and domestic services of hospitals and the rest. That seems to be a very good division.
I wonder whether the Minister who replies will take into account, with regard to the question of personnel, the vital importance of these people having training, in order to keep them up to date. Something has been said about refresher courses. There are many men serving in the Army, the Navy and Air Force who, if they had an opportunity, through the Ministry of Labour, to attend some courses on local government and then to go through the various departments of hospital and preventive treatment, would be potential local government officers. I understand that the training of such individuals has not been contemplated by the Ministry of Labour. An individual will have to go to some authority and ask whether someone can train him for such work. This matter is far too important to be left in that way. It is the duty of this House to see that the right people are employed as local government officers, and that they have every opportunity to learn the work connected with the services that we are continually passing on to them. There ought to be far more women officers employed in the local government service. It is the exception now to find a woman acting as assistant town clerk or in some such capacity.


Where women have been employed, especially in regard to billeting and housing questions, they have rendered unique services, and have been of very special value. I do not know whether the Minister would be willing to consider the setting-up of a sort of staff college where women, as well as men, who are anxious to undertake this very important work could be trained.
Something has been said about joint boards and the hon. Member for South Tottenham said that they should not be encouraged, and he was supported by one or two hon. Gentlemen. That might be the view of those who know the conditions of towns better than the conditions of country districts, but the Ministry of Health has probably got in mind certain services that we shall be debating shortly with regard to water and so on, where you cannot get an efficient service unless there is, over a wide area, joint working between the different authorities. A Bill is being introduced to provide water, which is so essential for every social service, and we must adopt such schemes in rural districts.
There is another matter I want to mention, because it affects my constituency. I have, in my constituency in Berkshire, two Charter boroughs. They are both very ancient and very reputable and they are representative of other Charter boroughs. At one time, each of them sent two Members of Parliament to this honourable House, and therefore, the constituency was rather over-represented. At the same time they have their traditions, and they are very proud of their history. I do not think that there has been a speech made by an hon. Member to-day who has not said that the attraction of local government is its tradition and the opportunity of service for the community. Some instruction ought to be given to this Boundary Commission to the effect that the limit of the size of the smallest borough should be that which a workman could reach. I do not want a borough made so big that a man cannot go from where he lives to the place where he works. To take the case of the two ancient boroughs I have in my constituency, one is Abingdon, where the Mother church is older than Westminster Abbey, and the other Wallingford, which is the highest point up the river where the Thames can be crossed, and has a place in English history which is almost unique

—a place of passages of arms and of great deeds. Are you going to sweep it all away? The Mace on the Table here at Westminster is modelled from the Mace actually in use at Wallingford and Abingdon, which is more ancient even that the Mace in this honourable Assembly.
When the matter of boundaries is considered, I do not say that the boundaries should necessarily remain as they are, but these boroughs should not merely be told that they could keep their Mayor, with chain, and that he could walk in procession on certain occasions. That is no use. That is only sham. You want to bring into the future the traditions of the past. As the River Thames in each of these places forms the boundary, it is most peculiar that the services of those two boroughs in respect to electricity, sewage and water are taken across the river to the other side. I hope that the Boundary Commission will also take into account in such places the inclusion of a conceivable amount that might be in another county. I do not think that these things should be sacrosanct. The measure of efficiency ought to be the most effective supplies of necessities to the inhabitants. It seems ridiculous that because somebody happens to live on the other side of a bridge, he should not have the amenities that are available a few hundred yards away.
If the position of Charter boroughs is really recognised, I would like to add to the plea already made by one hon. Member that, before the Boundary Commission take any steps against them, they should have the right, as possessing a Charter granted by King and Parliament years ago, of direct appeal to this House. It is a very small thing to ask. Those who give, surely have the right to say that they will not take away, until those to whom they have given it have had a chance to speak. I look forward to a time when the Charter boroughs will form the centre of a new administrative district, carrying forward the traditions of the past, which I think will greatly influence and attract a great many people who wish to give service to their local community.
The Minister of Health said he wanted the House to realise that this White Paper was drafted chiefly with the idea of conveying the importance of personnel to man the councils, and of the officers to carry out the administration. Also he wanted to see greater stability, so that any


plans that were being made by the councils would have some chance of being carried through over the period. His third reason was that he wanted to find increased vigour and confidence in the work done by local authorities. I think none of us who live in a county district need feel ashamed of the wonderful public work that has been done throughout the war by local authorities.
There is, however, something in this to which the Minister of Health must direct his attention. Owing to the cessation of elections to local authorities, there are now many instances where a small authority is proposing to carry out something or other, which is strongly objected to by the people in the locality concerned. I have no less than five petitions now in hand with the Ministry of Health, because they say that the proposals are not what the local community desire, but they have the approval of four or five officials of other Departments. I would like the Home Secretary to try to appreciate what happens in a village in the country. He knows all about the London County Council, but take the case of a village in the country, where there is a housing scheme. First the local authority says they are to have a certain number of houses. Nobody knows who decides the number of houses, or on what basis. Many villagers strongly object to having people from another village decanted into new houses in their village, but they are not asked. If there were representation and election on to these local bodies, these mistakes would not arise. Then, before the site or the scheme is finally decided, as the Ministry of Health knows, there must be the approval of a representative of the County Planning Committee and the Ministry of Agriculture, and three or four officials are brought in. In spite of the objection to the local people to the site or whatever it is, the scheme is carried through.
I would also draw the attention of the Minister of Health to this: The chairman of a local authority said that he had received a circular from the Ministry of Health saying that in no circumstance were owners of property to be informed that sites were to be taken for houses, because experience had shown that, if the owner of property were told that that was the use, objection might be 'taken, and delay to the scheme would result. It

seems to me most astonishing, if it is true, that any instruction could be sent out to any chairman of a local authority which would be so construed, because in the end it only creates bad feeling, and is no good. What is wanted is to make people cooperate, but if it is possible for the Ministry in London to say that schemes are to be carried out behind the backs of those who may object to them, that is not conducive to co-operation. If such a circular be necessary, I hope the right hon. and learned Gentleman will modify its terms or correct the false impression now created. I can give him particulars, including the names of the chairmen and the names of the owners of land who have written strongly objecting that they have never been approached or asked to cooperate in what is required.
I hope the Home Secretary will realise, as I think every Minister must realise, that most people are extremely tired at this stage of the war—including Ministers and Members of Parliament—and the strain imposed on members of the district councils is very great. I know a great many bodies which have been understaffed now for months. The officials have had little opportunity of holiday. Their pay has not been commensurate with the work they have done. In regard to the members of the councils, some are now appallingly old, and I hope steps will be taken in order that younger men and women can get on to councils. Most people are holding on to whatever jobs they have until the war ends, so that younger men and women can take their place. I agree with what the Minister of Health said, that we have to attract more women into the service, both as members of councils and as officials. I hope something will be done through the Ministry of Labour, through A.B.C.A, or any other medium, to draw the attention of people now in the Services to the opportunities that are opening, both as members of councils and as officials administering those councils.

5.7 p.m.

Mr. Lipson: As my time is short and I want to leave time for the Minister to reply I hope my hon. Friend will forgive me if I do not pursue the interesting topic he has raised. As one who has had to criticise the Minister of Health I would like to congratulate him on the political wisdom he has shown in


his White Paper, and he has the reward for that political wisdom in the general approval with which it has been received. Very wisely he said that he would not make any changes in the structure of local government at this time, for the best of reasons: that those who are now engaged in local government—and therefore the best able to judge of what changes are necessary—cannot agree about it themselves. Until they agree, he very wisely says: "I will not enter that very dangerous and difficult path." It seems to me that the question of a solution of the right structure of local government can be compared to the solution of the Indian constitutional problem. In India there are a great many parties which cannot agree upon what form of constitution they shall have, and the Government say "When you agree, you can have it." So it is with local government; the local associations cannot agree, and the Minister says: "When you can agree, I will bring forward my new proposals."
However, I hope this will not give too much power to Whitehall, because we remember the old Roman motto: "Divide and rule." Personally, I do not think that the structure of local government matters so much as many people are inclined to think. The question of personnel, both as regards the members of councils and the local government officers, is much more important. And, of course, the finance—whether local authorities will have enough money to carry out the very heavy responsibilities that are placed upon them is really of tremendous importance. I think, in fact, that is the crux of the whole problem.
I would ask my right hon. and learned Friend, in any changes that he is making, not to assume that the size of a local government unit is any indication of its efficiency. For that reason I welcome his decision not to continue any longer the regional system. I have not met anyone in local government circles who has had experience of the regional system who wants it to continue. It was created for a special war emergency—happily it never had to function as it was really intended to do—but now we are all glad to hear that it is dead. I would say: "Let it die unwept and unsung." I would like to put in a plea for the non-county borough as a local unit. I believe that in a non-county borough of reasonable size we get local government in as effi-

cient a form as anywhere, because there is a keen local interest.
I am concerned about the membership of county councils in the future. One has to remember that a great deal of time is spent in travelling to county council meetings. Also, they meet either in the morning or the afternoon, and we must bear in mind that ex-Servicemen and women, whom we want to see on these local authorities, will have their careers to make. They will not be able to give up time to attend county council meetings in the morning or afternoon. I hope, therefore, that we shall leave in the smaller areas enough responsibilities to attract such men and women into local government. Meetings can be held in their areas in the evenings, and they will find it convenient to attend. If we do not give these bodies sufficient responsibility they will degenerate, and people will go on to them only for opportunities of social advantage or patronage and there will be a danger of introducing jobbery into local government. So I put in a plea for the retention of the real, live non-county borough.
May I say a word or two about finance? I welcome the indication that the block grant system will be much more flexible in the future, and I hope it will be used exclusively for the benefit of the poorer authorities. I think the time has come when the richer authorities can possibly do without the block grant altogether. I believe that all local authorities benefit to the extent of 22½ per cent. of their rateable expenditure. The richer ones do not benefit so much, but at any rate such money as is available ought to be concentrated chiefly on the poorer authorities. I ask the Minister, when contemplating future local government finance, to consider whether the present rating system is the last word. I know the arguments for it. It has always been a very good, Conservative argument that the money is easy to collect and that collection is cheap, but in point of fact the system is ceasing to deliver the goods. Compared with 1913–14 the rateable value of the country has increased by only 50 per cent., whereas the national income has doubled during that time. The rates yield has increased, compared to 1913–14, two and a half times, while Income Tax and Supertax have gone up 8½ times. The present rating system is very hard on the man with a large family.
We are asking people to have more children. What is the result? They have to have larger houses and pay more in rates. The system is, based on the needs of the individual, and not on his ability to pay, and, therefore, I hope that consideration will be given to some other sources of revenue.
In conclusion, I welcome the setting up of the Boundary Commission, which is a sensible, practical and inexpensive way of making boundary changes. We are told that the members of that Commission will be carefully chosen. In the course of time they will obviously obtain considerable experience, and their work will tend to become more and more important. For the reasons I have outlined, although I know there are others, I want cordially to welcome the White Paper, and to congratulate the Minister on the reception it has had.

5.15 p.m.

The Secretary of State for the Home Deportment (Mr. Herbert Morrison): My right hon. and learned Friend the Minister of Health is, I think, to be congratulated on the friendly reception which his White Paper on Local Government has had from the House generally. Although there have been one or two speeches of a somewhat critical character, generally speaking Members in all parts of the House, of all parties, have welcomed the White Paper, and on behalf of my right hon. and learned Friend I would like to thank them and the House for that friendly reception. The Debate has, I think, been a very good Debate, well-informed, as so many House of Commons Debates on local government are, and the Government will, of course, take note of all the points which have been raised and give them that consideration and respect to which they are entitled. My purpose in replying is to deal with the more important points which have been made during the discussion, and to do my best to speak in accordance with the light and learning and principles favoured by the Ministry of Health. As, however, I do not live in the Ministry of Health, if I fall astray, no doubt my right hon. and learned Friend will forgive me, and blame it either on my Home Office surroundings, or my late prominent association with the London County Council.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Wakefield (Mr. Greenwood) did not com-

plain, but made a point of the fact that, in wording the Motion, we had not quite followed the procedure adopted on some previous occasions. I am afraid that that is so, and I want to say, on behalf of my right hon. and learned Friend, that if an error was made we are sorry about it, and can quite see the advantage of previous unofficial discussions. Of course, it does not mean that the solution of local government problems, other than those favoured by the Government now, are necessarily ruled out for all time. But the Government thought that local authorities were entitled to know how the Government's mind was moving, and what our broad intentions were, in order that they should have some reasonable degree of security for the future in the commitments into which they are entering. My right hon, Friend opposite was good enough to agree that that in itself was not unreasonable and, subject to the points he made, accepted the Motion. He agreed that there was a case for stability, but that we must always be ready to live and learn, and, with that, I agree.
My right hon. Friend referred to the Regional Commissioners and asked that there should be no confusion with regionalism in the local government sense of the term. I agree. In my judgment, for the purposes of the war the Regional Commissioners have done admirable work. They deserve the gratitude and appreciation of the nation, Parliament and the Press, and ought to get it and, on the whole, do get it. But the Government have announced in the White Paper that it is not intended to continue the Regional Commissioners after the war. They have been a great institution during the war, and have done a useful job without being dictators to the local authorities. Their relationship with the authorities has been very close, but they would not easily fit in with peace-time governmental administration, and, moreover, I do not see how they could fit in with our party system. My right hon. Friend referred to the importance of active and intelligent local interest in municipal affairs, and with that I entirely agree.
The hon. Member for Chippenham (Mr. Eccles) made a very able and helpful contribution to the Debate on municipal finance. The White Paper touches upon the point and, not ungenerously, admits that local authorities have certain accumulated claims which will have to be taken


into account by the Ministry of Health and the Treasury in due course. I think the House will agree that we cannot get far into this subject across the Floor at present. It is best for it to be discussed as hitherto, in the first instance between the financial advisers of the local authorities and the Minister's financial advisers to see how far they can get by way of agreement and subsequently, of course, there can be Debate in the House.
The hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Montgomery (Mr. C. Davies) said we were putting the cart before the horse, that we ought to have made up our minds as to local government areas first and proceeded with the reconstruction measures, such as the Education Bill, afterwards. I do not agree. If we were to do that, all these measures of reconstruction in which local government is involved would have had to be held up. It would take some years to reorganise local government and the machinery of reconstruction would have been delayed. I lived through the application to London of the Local Government Act, 1929, which absorbed the boards of guardians and the Metropolitan Asylums Board. Other Members lived through it on other authorities. It took years to frame the legislation and quite a period to fight it through the House, and more years for the local authorities to absorb and organise the transferred functions. I think the hon. and learned Gentleman was really advocating a course which would simply have checked the march of progress and held up the reconstruction work in which local government is involved.
The hon. Member for The Wrekin (Mr. Colegate) raised a number of points of some importance. The first was in relation to the footnote on page 5, which deals with the transfer of services to county councils The allocation of services between the various classes of local authorities would not be a matter for the Boundary Commissioners. They are concerned with boundaries, status and nothing else. It is true that, in recommending or determining boundaries, they must consider the allocation of functions as the law provides, and they may make comments and observations to the Minister from time to time, but any change of function between one class of local authority and another could not be made by the Boundary Commissioners. It would have to be the subject of legislation

for which, presumably, the Minister of Health would be responsible. The hon. Member also suggested that someone with either rural local government experience, or identified with rural life, should be a member of the Boundary Commission. My right hon. and learned Friend tells me he is anxious not to give undertakings of a specific character about the composition of the Boundary Commission, and certainly it is not intended that it should be a representative Commission in the sense that it represents various classes of local authorities, and that view is accepted by the local authorities' associations. They ought to be independent, otherwise it would be difficult to get any coherent decisions or judicial temper out of them. Subject to all those reservations, and promising nothing whatever, my right hon. and learned Friend agrees that, other things being convenient, the outlook of a rural mind is a fair point to take into account in appointing the Boundary Commission, but he must remain uncommitted.
The next point was the question of the minor authorities' right to an inquiry. I thought my right hon. and learned Friend had gone a fair way in this matter. He has said that, if there is a prima facie case for an inquiry, it will obviously be given consideration. If a County Council asks for an inquiry it will get it. The Minister himself can order that there shall be an inquiry in a particular case. I do not think a minor authority need fear, in a real prima facie case, that it will not get its inquiry. I hope that will meet the spirit of what the hon. Member said.

Sir H. Webbe: Will the right hon. Gentleman repeat the Minister's assurance that, where a decision of the Boundary Commission is objected to by a minor authority, they have a right to an inquiry?

Mr. Morrison: My right hon. and learned Friend says that is so. With regard to the observations of my hon. Friend the Member for Brightside (Mr. Marshall), I am in a little difficulty, because there are policy declarations about local government Orders. I must pay my hon. Friend the Member for South Tottenham (Mr. Messer) the tribute that he did his best to observe the constitutional and official line, but there have been tendencies the other way. The hon. Member for Brightside said that regionalism would be resisted at all costs, and I think at pre-


sent he is probably right in the full-blooded sense of the term. I am talking of regionalism in the sense of elected regional authorities. He may be right at present. He was opposed to joint boards. I do not like them either. They are undemocratic and unrepresentative and are always in danger of going wrong. For the finance committee of a local authority to be precepted upon by a joint authority is too bad. There is often more "joint" than "authority" about it. But there are cases in which one cannot help having a joint authority. I do not like them, and I do not know that my right hon. and learned Friend is enthusiastic about them, but all he says—and I do not see how he can be answered—is that there are particular cases where their creation is the only thing to do and they must be made to work in the best possible way. The alternative would be the regional organisation, which taxes us too far the other way
The hon. Member for Stretford (Mr. Etherton) asked whether the Commission would be able to recommend joint boards and whether they could make a claim for the local government of Merseyside, I suppose in the way that a Royal Commission made a proposal for the government of Tyneside some time ago. The answer is that they cannot. That is a mater for the Minister and Parliament. I think it will be agreed that this Commission should not be permitted to invent new joint boards and special schemes of local government for this or that area and that it is not a power which should be put into the hands of any Commission. That is a matter of Government policy which Parliament should determine on the advice of the responsible Minister.

Mr. Molson: In cases where there is a great conurbation and there are numerous local authorities which date from earlier times, are we to understand that it is to be beyond the power of the Commission so to alter the boundaries as to make one local authority for the whole area?

Mr. Morrison: It can recommend the creation of a county borough, and then Parliament will follow on with all its rights. In that sense the Commission can recommend the absorption of a number of authorities into a county borough, and that, I think, is about the only thing it can do. If my hon. Friend is raising the point, as I thought he was, whether

the Commission could create a new type of authority outside the ordinary run of local authorities, the answer is that it cannot.

Mr. Etherton: Could it not recommend the creation of an all-purposes joint board, an authority in some way similar to the London County Council?

Mr. Morrison: The London County Council is not an all-purpose joint authority. In the first place, it is not all-purposes, and, in the second, it is not a joint authority. It is an elected body.

Mr. Messer: Sometimes it is out of joint.

Mr. Morrison: If we get to the point of inventing new methods of local government, or departing from the normal, it must be done on Ministerial authority with Parliamentary assent. [Interruption] I assumed my hon. Friends were agreeing with me, but I gather that they are not.

Mr. Molson: My right hon. Friend has referred to the Tyneside Commission. It made two proposals. One was that the whole of Tyneside should be turned into a single local government area. I understand that the proposed Boundary Commission could recommend that it should be created a county borough, subject to the approval of Parliament. It made another proposal which was for a new kind of regional authority and that, I understand, is what is ruled out.

Mr. Morrison: The Commission could recommend that the whole of the Tyneside area should be one county borough. I do not know) that they would, but technically they could. They could not, however, recommend a new type of authority. The Royal Commission on Tyneside were appointed, they had a long journey, and their report was presented, but that was the end of it, and I am sorry for the members of the Commission.
The hon. Member for Stretford would like the general directions put in the Bill. There are two good reasons why they should be issued by the Minister. One is that the Bill is of some urgency, and to work them out would delay the preparation of the Bill. There would have to be consultations with local authorities, and that would cause further delay. It would mean a big amount of details in the Bill and a delay over its passage. The second reason—and this is worth remembering, both from the Parliamentary and the local


authority point of view—is that in six or 12 months after the Minister has issued the general directions, some new fact may emerge or the Minister may have innocently made some mistake, so that the directions will require to be altered. He can alter them and bring them again to the House for an affirmative Resolution. I do not think the Minister has been inconsiderate to Parliament in proposing to bring them to the House for an affirmative Resolution, and I think that it is a reasonable course to take.

Mr. Etherton: May I ask the Minister not to exclude from his mind the desirability of giving Parliament some method of being able to modify the proposals, because on an affirmative Resolution it either has to reject them in toto or affirm them?

Mr. Morrison: If Parliament has a feeling about something, whether it is fundamental or on a point of important detail, it will find a way of getting its own way. The procedure must be the affirmative Resolution, which can be rejected or negatived, but I am certain that, if the Minister goes substantially wrong, Parliament will find its way of squeezing him. My hon. Friend and others will take part in it, if they so wish, and will be able to make their pressure felt. I have been amazed during the time I have been a Minister to find how now and again I have been so successfully squeezed by Parliament when it has been determined to get its own way. It is extraordinary how the democratic will of Parliament can make its weight felt. If my hon. Friend consults with his clever associates, or the Whips, or myself, we will give him all the advice we can as to how he can squeeze the Minister of the day.
The next point was about reduction in the size of non-county boroughs. I cannot say anything categorical about that. The request was that they should be able to appeal to Parliament, but I cannot commit the Government or my right hon. and learned Friend. He will, however, look into the point and give it consideration. I thought that the hon. Member for Harwich (Sir S. Holmes) went rather off the rails, and I was glad to see that the Chair thought so too. But I am glad to welcome him to the board, as he was once a member of the London County Council, and I still am, although one would hardly notice it nowadays. He "pulled the leg"

of the Labour Party about its policy declaration on regionalism. That was subsequently picked up in a very able speech by my hon. Friend the Member for South Tottenham. The hon. Member for Harwich quoted from a book which, I understand, was written long ago by my right hon. Friends the Deputy Prime Minister and the Minister of Aircraft Production, but if he expects me to comment on that book, I will not do so. I once gave evidence to a Royal Commission on London government. That was 25 years ago, and I do not want to be reminded of that. If the hon. Gentleman had been bright that is the thing he would have got hold of. Then he got on to the future of the National Fire Service, but Mr. Speaker said that was out of Order, and I am content to abide by Mr. Speaker's Ruling.
My hon. Friend the Member for South Tottenham, in what everybody agreed was an admirable and constructive speech, was absolutely right. He said that as a local government man he did not mind what we did with electricity, gas, water and drainage. What he wants to keep in his hands as a local government man are the human services like health, education, and housing. I think he is right. When you come to economic undertakings, you have to find what is the best administrative and managerial set-up for the efficient running of the industry, but when you come to human services, efficiency has to be balanced with humanity. That is where the spirit of my hon. Friend came in, and in that I entirely agree with him. He referred to the Middlesex County rate, and said a penny produces £80,000 or so, while in Lancashire a penny rate produces £40,000; and he asked what is the good of comparing them and said that their services were bound to be affected. On the other hand, it is the case that to a material extent that deficiency in rateable value is met by the Exchequer contributions. I do not know whether it is so met wholly or not, and I would not expect Lancashire to admit it even if it were. The percentage of Exchequer grant to income from grant plus rates is, in the case of Middlesex, 32.9. In Lancashire it is 50.2. So my hon. Friend will see that to some material extent, at any rate, it is taken care of.

Mr. Messer: There is 11 per cent. difference in the grant.

Mr. Morrison: He also had things to say about the joint board, and he is quite


right. I have seldom heard of the proceedings of such a board being reported upon by their representatives to the council. I give this credit to the Thames Conservancy Board, that the representatives used to send an annual report to the council, although I think it was rather laboriously written out by the Clerk to the Thames Conservancy Board; but it came to us as a report to the council by representatives of the L.C.C. on the Thames Conservancy Board. It really came from the clerk, which was an easy way of doing it but it was not exactly the action of the members.
The hon. Member for the Abbey Division (Sir H. Webbe) referred to the directions to the Boundary Commissioners and particularly to the point about town and country While it was a matter of difficulty to express in the White Paper what we felt about this town and country element without being misunderstood, and indeed without opening ourselves to legitimate criticism, I quite appreciate the point that my hon. Friend made. This is worth thinking about. I do not know what we are to do with the great cities. I doubt whether you can do it, but if you could have units of local authority councils where they had responsibility for built-up areas and green areas; where the spirit of the countryside was blended with the spirit of the town; where the townsman had to take notice of the problems of the countryside and the countryman had to take notice of the problems of the town; if you could see to it that the local authority, having once got a green area round their town did not, out of pure conceit, proceed to get it built upon, in order to add to their rateable value and their population; I say that there is much to be said for that conception. There is, however, force in the practical difficulty. My hon. Friend said that you may be forcing upon the countryman services which he does not want. Sometimes he does not want them because he is a little bit unprogressive in his ideas. Sometimes, I must admit, he does not want them because he does not need them, but nevertheless you have to make him have them, and he has to help to pay for them.
I wish it had been possible years and years ago, before we committed this vast mistake of Greater London, to have had a

central urban authority, to have had a green belt area; to have said: "That green belt shall not be built upon and anyone who wants to build must go farther off because there is going to be God's countryside within reach of a town and the green belt is going to be preserved"; that would have been right. It is, however, the case that a very high number of small urban communities already, under the review of county districts under the Local Government Act of 1929, were shown to have considerable rural territory round them. I agree about the difficulties, but this is the spirit in which the Government have put these ideas into the White Paper. We have no illusions; we do not think that life is as simple as we would like it to be.
Staff training and recruitment were referred to by the hon. Member for the Park Division of Sheffield (Mr. Burden) and I agree generally with him. We have not come to the end of this story yet. There is a problem of local government staffing, recruitment, training and promotion. I remember the late Sir Kingsley Wood asking me to give him a little help by taking the chair at an informal conference with the local authority associations at the Ministry of Health years ago. I did what I could. We certainly got on well, till one association remembered something. I suspect it was an element in regard to local appointments and local patronage—nothing corrupt, of course. They suddenly remembered it and said, "Ha, ha, Whitehall is trying to get hold of something." Whitehall was not trying to do anything of the kind. Sir Kingsley Wood was not. I know there is a problem here about proper recruitment and training, and as far as can be done by examination, of giving promotion in local government offices, of the interchangeability of pension rights and all that sort of thing.
I would like to see a good municipal civil service, in which the officers were the officers of the local authority but in which there was a channel of promotion, training and selection and so on, under which I am certain that, high as is the quality of our local government service officials, it could become very much higher. If it is to be done, local authorities really must believe that the Ministry of Health is not plotting to take things out of their hands. The Ministry of Health is concerned with the quality of


the service and must take account, and will take account, of the problems of the local authorities.
My hon. Friend the Member for Abingdon (Sir R. Glyn) got into a curious sort of state about the regions. He said "I am most anxious to get rid of the Regional Commissioners." Well, they are going all right. When the hon. Member was not here, I paid a tribute to their work, which I am always happy to do in war time. [HON. MEMBERS: "He was here "] I beg his pardon. I am sorry. When my hon. Friend had got rid of the Regional Commissioners after the war, he looked round and asked: "Who am I going to talk to? The dear Regional Commissioners have gone." He remembered that there were the regional offices of the Departments—the Ministry of Labour and the Ministry of Health, and others—and he asked whether we could arrange for an official, instead of a Regional Commissioner, to convene meetings of Members of Parliament and representatives of local authorities. It is a fair point. I think the hon. Member has a real point. I was only a little alarmed at his being so anxious to get away from the civilian non-official Commissioner and wanting to be summoned into the presence of one of these regional officials. I think regional officers of the appropriate State Departments will go on. There may be a tendency for the number of State Departments who have regional officers to increase. There is a lot to be said for it. A good many things can be settled on the spot without the delay of worrying Whitehall. It is a fair point. It is a good way for the Departments to keep in touch with representatives of the local authorities, and indeed members of Parliament, if that should be desired.
The hon. Member also referred to the training of local government officers, and the possibility of a staff college. I cannot say anything about that, but the point has been noted by my right hon. Friend The Minister has also noted what my hon. Friend said about housing sites and he will be in communication with my hon. Friend. The hon. Member for Cheltenham (Mr. Lipson) referred to the rating system and asked: "Is it the last word in wisdom?" I do not know. I only say this: Once upon a time I plastered the walls of London with the slogan: "Vote for the Labour Party and a municipal Income Tax." A few weeks after the

election—which we did not win, but in which we had made considerable progress as usual—the hon. Member for Bow and Bromley (Ms. Key), who was then prominently associated, as he still is, with local government work in Poplar, came to my office and asked "How much income do you think Poplar will get out of this municipal Income Tax of yours?" It was rather a shock, and I must confess I was rather doubtful about it myself. Since then the walls of London have not seen any posters about a municipal income Tax.
I could make a considerable speech against the rating system, but the trouble is to find something that is better. What we have done as the years have gone on, is to merge the rating system, which started in 1601 under Queen Elizabeth, with the device of the grant-in-aid, so that you have a fusion of national taxation and all its elasticity, with the rating system and its admitted lack of elasticity. I do not say that that is perfect, but I think there is more to be said for it than, perhaps, one would think at first sight. I cannot think of anything better myself and I would only say to my hon. Friend: "Let us all go on thinking, and if we think of something better, we will tell the Minister of Health about it, and he can set his learned officers about it, and let us hope something will survive when they have had a cut at it."
May I say, by way of conclusion, that it is perfectly true that the tendency of local government is towards the exercise of local government functions by county boroughs and county councils. That is the undoubted tendency of the last 25 years or even longer. As to what the reason for that is, there is a conflict between the arguments we have heard to-day on behalf of large scale administration, coupled with certain devices to check them, that were put forward by the hon. Member for South Tottenham, and the arguments for the small authority which have been put by various other hon. Members. In the course of my regional Civil Defence tours in the South-West of England, I went to a lovely old town hall, I think in Dartmouth. It is full of history and all sorts of relics, but the population of that place is quite limited now, and it would not stand a chance today of being made a borough. I felt that I could not be a party to destroying this


sort of little local authority, with a long history behind it. But the tendency of all administrations, whether Government, local authority or commercial, is towards a somewhat larger unit of administration. Then, of course, there is the case for the consolidation of the various local government services, and, in one way or another, the tendency has undoubtedly been towards the county and county borough authority. I do not intend to argue the point—there is not time—but that is the tendency, and whatever reasons there are against it, there must be reasons of substance for it.
On the other hand, the county districts, that is, the urban and rural districts, and the non-county boroughs, are vigorous local authorities that have rendered considerable local service to the community, and have existed a long time. The urban and rural districts were brought into existence by the Local Government Act, 1894, and they have done good work. As between scrapping them, and merging them all in the county council, I am sure the general opinion of Parliament would at present be that the county districts should be preserved. It has always been a question whether their areas do not require review, and this machinery of the Boundary Commission, which follows upon the county review under the Act of 1929, is designed to secure an adjustment of the county districts, and I should think the tendency will be, broadly, for them to become somewhat larger in territory as time goes on. That we shall see.
What was the real case for regionalism? It was the case that a number of services were beyond the capacity of the average local authority, even the county borough council, even the county council. But these services were largely economic in character—municipal passenger transport, electricity, gas, water, drainage. There I stop for the time being. I suggest to the House that these economic questions of transport, electricity and gas, whatever may be said about water, are tending more and more to be settled on some sort of national basis. I say "some sort" because I am speaking for all parties. I think that is inevitable, and there does emerge a class of subjects formerly within the field of local government which may be dealt with as a national problem. We are not trying to invent that. The number of cases in

which the State has taken services from the local authorities for itself are very limited. One was unemployment assistance, or outdoor relief, which was taken from the local authorities, at the urgent request of the local authorities themselves, because they wanted to get rid of the financial burden, and I think they were right. In so far as we come to deal with them nationally, in some way or other, as economic problems it ceases to be an issue in favour of the regional local government idea. Water is mid-way between the two, and we are moving towards the joint board, and the same applies to drainage. Both of these, as the hon. Member for South Tottenham said, are engineers' questions rather than human questions. Fundamentally it does not matter so much in relation to local government.
The other service is hospitals. There the view of the Minister of Health and the Government was that it would not be right to take the hospitals over into a national concern. I think that is quite right, but it is the case that hospital administration is beyond the administrative ability of a large number of county boroughs. It is even beyond a large number of county councils. Therefore the Minister was driven, and I was dragged with him, to swallow the joint board doctrine, because we did not see what else we could do with that problem. That is why that question is being dealt with under the joint board doctrine. The only other subject I can remember where the case for the big regional idea exists is town and country planning. Quite an argument can be made in regard to this subject. But we now have the Minister of Town and Country Planning. That Minister has regional offices. If the Ministry of Town and Country Planning has its broad national ideas of development, if its regional officers, with the concurrence of the Minister, have their ideas how the region should develop, all the machinery is there to give effective regional co-ordination in town planning as between local authorities and the Ministry. I think that is the way that question will have to be solved, and thereby the national interest will be kept in mind.
The case for the big regional local government idea is not as great as it was some years ago, I think it is weaker, but I think there is a case. There are the


pros and cons of the matter, and it is a matter for the future to decide. As far as this Government are concerned and as far as they can see, this White Paper points the best way to proceed, and we accordingly commend it to the House.
Finally, I join with everybody who has paid a tribute to British local government. Our democracy, Parliamentary democracy itself, owes a lot to local government. The local authorities generally, their officers and members, have served the country well over the years. They have certainly served the country well during the war period. They have been called upon—and in this I include all of them, counties, county boroughs, county districts, Metropolitan boroughs—to administer a large number of strange, new services, some of which were not particularly natural to local government. They have undertaken them and adapted themselves, and taking them by and large they have been a first-class success in the administration of these war-time Civil Defence services and other services. Our belief as a Government is that the record of British local government is a great one. We appreciate what they have done in the war, and our only anxiety is that the future of British local government may be as brilliant and worthy as its past.

Ouestion put, and agreed to.

Resolved:
That this House welcomes the intention of the Government to preserve the existing framework of the county and county borough system of local government and the proposals for the establishment of a Local Government Boundary Commission outlined in the White Paper presented to Parliament.

AIR ACCIDENTS

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House do now adjourn."—[Mr. Pym.]

5.59 p.m.

Mr. Quintin Hogg: The House has heard with deep regret, and the country with grave disquiet, of the melancholy and mounting toll of air accidents among the persons carried by Transport Command and kindred services. Since 7th February this matter has been before the House at Question time on no fewer than three occasions, and in no case has the House, I think, received the measure of reassurance which it sought. I need

only call to mind facts which are within the recollection of all—the deaths of two gallant commanders and of two well-loved and conscientious Members of this House and of that urbane brilliant servant of this country, Mr. Peter Loxley, lost with all his papers and some of his colleagues; all within a matter of weeks.

It being Six o'Clock, the Motion for the Adjournment of the House lapsed, without Question put

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House do now adjourn."—[Mr. Pym.]

Mr. Hogg: The details of these losses have never yet been given to the public. What the public never has learned, and never will know, is the number of accidents which have not proved fatal, and the number of accidents which have taken place and have proved fatal to people who do not come within the category of very important persons. It would be a mistake to say that this was an entirely new problem. Ever since the beginning of the war the death rate of air transport has been a great deal too high. It was already so much in my mind on 1st September, 1943, that I wrote to my right hon. Friend about it. On that occasion I called to his attention a number of the older accidents in which persons, each one of whom might have been worth an Army Corps to our side, had either died or risked their lives in quite avoidable mishaps.
I need only recall the case of His Royal Highness the Duke of Kent. We all know that that plane ought not to have been flying on that route or at that height. There was General Pope, in the Middle East, who was the first commander of our First Armoured Corps. There was General Gott, who was considered of such brilliance among desert commanders as to be appointed before General Montgomery to command the Eighth Army in one of the decisive battles of the war. He was carried back over the desert in an obsolete type of aircraft, without escort, at a time when they knew Messerschmidts were about. Perhaps it is not so well known that Field-Marshal Wilson suffered an accident, which nearly proved fatal, on Ismailia airfield, owing to insufficient landing arrangements. General Sikorski, whose death is perhaps even more felt now than it was at the time, was allowed to take off from the dangerous landing


strip at Gibraltar in a plane which had been loaded up with extra human passengers at the very last moment. We have not received, in respect of these older accidents, or in respect of the newer accidents, any real reassurance from my right hon. Friend. On the contrary, there has been a disquieting tendency on his part to try to make us think that everything is all right. There was a poem by a 19th century poet about a doctor whose prescriptions always went wrong. I think he poisoned a dog, and did something else to a cat, and each stanza ends with the words:
 'Yes, yes,' said the doctor, 'I meant it for that.' 
There is a nasty savour of that 19th century doctor about the assurances that we get from time to time from the Air Ministry when they come to deal with air accidents. As regards the recent accidents, all I can say is that the facts have not been made known and are still subject to inquiry. All we do know is that the Expediter plane, at this time of the year, over the mountains of Italy, was sent out with a distinguished cargo and that it was a plane not fitted with any de-icing equipment. We have been led to believe that Mr. Peter Loxley's plane ran short of petrol, and that it was a York, which is supposed to carry petrol for the longest possible flights. In some cases we hear even more disquieting information, which cannot be substantiated because the facts arc not known, that parachutes are stowed away in parts of the aeroplane which are inaccessible, and that pilots are sometimes induced to undertake flights against their better judgment, that engines and wings have fallen from planes and that some planes used for transport purposes are not really airworthy.
There is a doctrine in law which lawyers call the doctrine of res ipsa loquitur, which means that, where things are obviously going wrong with a system or an organisation which ought to work reasonably well, it is not for the plaintiff to make out a case; it is for those who are responsible for the system or organisation to defend themselves, because, as lawyers say, the thing speaks for itself. Safety is not a single factor. It depends on many different factors; on good maintenance, on good airfield staff, good planes, good pilots and a good deal of commonsense, but. I do suggest that this melancholy list

of mishaps is sufficient to indicate some grounds for thinking that safety, at present, is not being given a high enough priority in transport activity.
The public are not, I think, prepared to accept it from the Secretary of State that all is perfectly well. The air is not inherently as dangerous a form of travel as that would imply, and it would be disastrous if the impression went abroad, which I am sure would be false, that our pilots, or planes or our organisation were not every bit as good as the best that the rest of the world can produce. I feel certain that there is deep public disquiet on this matter. The House requires more information, independent inquiries, less complacency, less insistence upon the need of military security in matters about which hon. Members are by no means satisfied that security considerations exist or should be paramount, and some guarantee of positive action. Otherwise, I feel confident that the sense of public disquiet will be displaced by public outcry.

6.9 p.m.

Mr. Edgar Granville: There is unfortunately a strange apathy towards human losses during a war other than those suffered at the hands of the enemy, and therefore I think that we are indebted to the hon. Member for Oxford (Mr. Hogg) for raising this matter on the Adjournment. I have no doubt that the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for Air will defend the Air Ministry like a Gladstone, as it were, but I hope he will bear in mind that nobody is prepared to criticise the Royal Air Force or that gallant band of accident investigators who are something like mechanical detectives and render great service in reaching important conclusions as a result of their inquiries into aircraft accidents. I hope that, as a result of this short Debate, subject to security considerations, the fullest publicity is going to be given by the Press and the B.B.C. to the causes of these various disasters, as is given in the case of railway accidents, and accidents upon the roads and at sea.
I have had some experience with regard to the causes of air accidents, and there are many practical details on which some of us would like the right hon. Gentleman to give considered answers if not to-night at some other time, and provide more information than he has given us in the past. We would like to know whether


the aircraft compasses are tested after each long-distance section of an extended flight. [An HON. MEMBER: "Of course not."] Well, they ought to be. When an aircraft lands at night and takes off next morning for the flight on the next day compasses ought to be checked as far as possible. We would like to know if passengers are issued with what are called by the R.A.F. "Mae Wests" or emergency lifebelts, and do these York machines and the other transport machines that are used carry rubber emergency lifeboats? What is the practice in the Royal Air Force and in British Overseas Airways in regard to a routine certificate of airworthiness such as is necessary with regard to civil aviation which ensures reliability? Are Royal Air Force rescue launches available at the various Royal Air Force sea, stations not only in this country, but at important coastal focal points abroad? Then, as my hon. Friend said by implication, who is it who makes the decision to fly in bad weather? Is it the pilot or is it the officer commanding the particular airfield at which the machine has touched down or originally taken off? Finally, I would like to know from the right hon. Gentleman if there is radio contact-and communication not only between the machine and the home or intermediate station but between machines when travelling in a flight. There is the fatigue of crews, too. Anyone who has anything to do with the reports of accident inquiries knows that fatigue is always a considerable factor at the end of a crossing. I hope he will look at the point of mechanical routine, supervision and inspection and investigate fully the question referred to by the hon. Member for Ipswich (Mr. Stokes) and myself the other day of the provision and efficiency of de-icing equipment.
There have been many losses described by my hon. Friend. There will be a large number of conferences to be attended by statesmen and officials in the future, and the House of Commons requires from the Minister for Air some sort of assurance that there is going to be a complete overhaul of whatever department of the Air Ministry is responsible for the whole organisation of these flights. The right hon. Gentleman has several courts of inquiries on his hands, and I hope that when he gets the result of these investigations, which I hope he is going to expedite, he will make them available to

the House and to Parliament and the widest possible public opinion as a contribution to prevent a repetition of these serious accidents and loss of valuable life.

6.13 p.m.

Mr. Molson: We do not in this House attach more importance to the recent accident in which two of our colleagues lost their lives than we do to any of these other accidents in which important passengers have been killed, but it is natural that one's friends in Italy should write to one about the circumstances in which the accident took place. A few days ago I received a letter, from which I will proceed to quote:
I do not think that Bernays and Campbell or any of them should have been allowed to travel the way they did on that particular day. The weather was damnable and they were carried in two aircraft which I do not believe were suited to the weather conditions. I think I am right in saying they were not fitted with de-icing apparatus.

Major Studholme: On a point of explanation. May I say that we left Rome in perfect weather? It was not until we got to Bari, on the far side of the mountains right down the Adriatic, that the storm started to come up. There was no reason whatever when we left Rome, as far as I could see, why we should not have started.

Mr. Molson: One presumes that even in the case of transport aircraft there is some knowledge of what the weather conditions are going to be at the destination.

Mrs. Tate: What are weather reports for?

Mr. Molson: I proceed to the case of the South East Asia Command, where also there has been a large number of accidents. I understand that Hudson aircraft have been in use there for the transport of important personages which had reached a time in their life when repair was considered uneconomical and when they were not going to be further reconditioned but were going to be scrapped. It was at this time they were still being used for transport purposes in the South-East Asia Command. These are the kind of facts which come to one in the ordinary course of one's inquiries into these matters, and I hope we shall have an assurance from the Secretary of State that all these matters will be investigated. Moreover, I would ask him to consider whether


it would not be in the general interests of civil aviation, if a certain amount of publicity were given to these accidents, and explanation of the circumstances in which they arise.

6.16 p.m.

The Secretary of State for Air (Sir Archibald Sinclair): I do not think that hon. Members will expect me to answer to-day every point which has been put in the course of this short Debate. I can assure them that every point which they have put will be most carefully studied and considered, but there are some which I must answer as I go along. Let me say at once to the hon. Member for Eye (Mr. Granville)—because another hon. Member mentioned the same point to me privately—that certainly it is the responsibility of the pilot to decide whether or not to start on his flight. It does happen sometimes that a pilot is subjected to pressure by high officers and others who see the weather is good, and are obsessed by the importance of the mission on which they are travelling, and I have more than once ruled that we must give the utmost possible support to the pilots in such circumstances, and the pilot alone—as indeed is the rule and practice —must decide.

Mr. Henderson Stewart: Is that in military flying as well as transport?

Sir A. Sinclair: Military flying, of course, is a matter of operations, where the commanding officer must decide. I am, of course, referring to transport operations. The hon. Member for Oxford (Mr. Hogg), who opened the Debate, spoke of Air Ministry assurances as though they were always soothing syrup, as though we always made out that flying was perfectly safe and that accidents did not happen. That is certainly not true of any statement that I have ever made. I am too conscious of the hazards which still, in certain circumstances, must attach to flying. All I have ever said—and that I repeat with deep sincerity—is that I, and those who work with me at the Air Ministry, and I know in Transport and the other Commands, are strenuously, by every means in our power, studying the means of reducing accidents. Perhaps I may be permitted to remind. hon. Members that I devoted a passage in my last Estimates speech to that subject, and gave the

House some indication of the measures that we have taken recently in the Air Ministry to increase our precautions, our measures to prevent accidents.
I do not think that the public realise—indeed, the public cannot sufficiently realise, because in war time we cannot, for reasons of security, give all the facts and the figures—the rapidity of Transport Command expansion, the difficulties of opening up new routes, and the huge scale on which Transport Command is now operating. The greater part of their work, of course, is in direct support of the Armed Forces in all theatres of war—the air-transported forces, training for that role, carrying supplies, reinforcements, spare parts. All that side is the bulk of their work. However, this evening I shall only deal with—because I know that is all hon. Members want me to deal with—the trunk and feeder services.
The air routes to the Mediterranean and to the Far East are an important and a new factor in our system of strategic communications. They have been very rapidly developed from the old reinforcement routes which we had for combat aircraft. In the past the great air, routes of the world have been. built up gradually, airfield by airfield, gaps filled in here and there. These routes we have had to develop with unprecedented speed. The requirements of such routes in skilled men, accommodation, large airfields, signalling facilities, navigational aids, and, of course, the meteorological organisation, are exacting, and it is necessary, during war-time, that priorities should go to the other Commands, whose impact on the enemy is more direct. Moreover, technical improvements like the retractable under-carriage, and the increasing weight and speed of aircraft, are themselves, when they first come into use, potential sources of accidents. Flying, too, is now being done in almost every kind of weather, and in war-time there are additional sources of danger, such as occasional need to send aircraft over indirect routes to avoid risk of interception by the enemy, and also the restrictions which have to be imposed from time to time in certain areas on. the use of wireless communication. There are also the dangers inseparable from climatic variations at different seasons of the year and in different parts of the world, and appalling storms and electrical disturbances, to which the Noble Lord the


Member for Horsham and Worthing (Earl Winterton) referred the other day.
It is against this background that I invite the House to judge the outstanding achievement of Transport Command in flying 4,000,000 miles in the very wintry month of January, on its main trunk and feeder routes, without a single accident causing death or serious injury to a passenger. This was, of course, an exceptional achievement, and I am sure that the House will not wish to withhold credit from our splendid crews. There is no fear of the world under-estimating—I can assure my hon. Friend the Member for Oxford of this—the skill and efficiency of our crews. The Commander-in-Chief, his subordinate commanders and staffs, the maintenance crews—the importance of which has been mentioned more than once by hon. Members in discussions on this subject, and rightly—flying control, the meteorological organisation, the flying training system, scientists and all in the aircraft industry, the Ministry of Aircraft Production and the Air Ministry are strenuously working all the time to prevent accidents—

Earl Winterton: Can the right hon. Gentleman devote the remainder of his speech not to praise of his own Department or the Royal Air Force but to explaining the circumstances which have given rise to this Debate?

Sir A. Sinclair: If I may say so to the Noble Lord, I think that is an ungenerous observation. I was told that there was a melancholy and mounting toll of accidents in Transport Command—[HON. MEMBERS: "So there are"]—and I am entitled to say that in January it was an astonishing achievement for 4,000,000 miles to be flown without a single accident involving death or injury. That ought to be placed on record, because I do not think the House as a whole would wish to withhold credit from those to whom it is due.
These passengers are nearly all travelling on urgent Government business, a large proportion of them being Ministers, senior officials and high ranking officers of the three Services, and a few of the fatal accidents which have occurred on these routes have, therefore, attracted much publicity. Thousands of successful flights have attracted little, and a false impression is thus created.
The hon. and gallant Gentleman who opened the Debate mentioned two gallant officers, and when I asked who they were, he mentioned the case of Admiral Ramsay, which had nothing to do with Transport Command or the Royal Air Force, and he mentioned General Gott, a lamentable loss which we all feel, but he was attacked by the enemy. His aircraft was shot at, the pilot made a good landing on the airfield, and at the end of the landing run the enemy aircraft swept down and opened another burst of fire and the aircraft burst into flames. It is not really fair to the Royal Air Force or to Transport Command, who had nothing to do with the accident, to drag these cases in.
Take the accident to the Dakota which crashed into the South Downs just over a week ago. That belonged to a group of Transport Command formed just before the invasion of Normandy. Since then their aircraft have flown regularly to congested airfields, and hastily constructed air strips, in France and the Low Countries, often in the worst possible flying weather. Since D-Day that group has flown 141,000 passengers, mainly soldiers and airmen. That accident was its first that involved death or injury to a passenger. It is not giving the House a true impression of the facts to say that things are going wrong. The facts are that far from things going wrong, we are reducing the accident rate by these strenuous efforts to which I have referred in all commands of the Royal Air Force and in particular in Transport Command.
One hon. Member referred to the accident to General Sikorski. He said it was due to overloading the plane in which he travelled. That is not true. It had nothing whatever to do with the accident. It had quite a simple explanation. A piece of machinery in the aircraft broke and, when the pilot tried to move the controls, he found them firmly locked. As a matter of fact, nearly half a million pasengers are carried by Transport Command in a year, and the number is rising, but the chance of a passenger meeting with a fatal accident works out, on current experience, at 1/30 of 1 per cent. During a recent period in which Transport Command flew 37,500,000 miles, only 11 accidents involving death or serious injury to a passenger occurred—one such accident for every 3,500,000 miles flown.

Wing-Commander Grant-Ferris: When a machine is flown over a certain route, is the main criterion that the pilot should have real experience of that route?

Sir A. Sinclair: That is a very important point and one which particularly came up in the lamentable accident to Sir Trafford Leigh-Mallory. Commanders-in-Chief have a right to their own personal crews, but it is a point on which we have definitely ruled that Transport Command is to have the duty and responsibility of ensuring that crews, carrying even Commanders-in-Chief on their own aircraft on the main transport routes, are acquainted with the route on which they travel. We are fully alive to the importance of that point. I agree that it would be disastrous if it got abroad that our crews and aircraft were not the best. It would be a very false impression. The Royal Air Force has owed much during the war to the confidence and support of Parliament. I

therefore ask the House to extend that same confidence and support in generous measure to this new, growing, vigorous and increasingly important Command. I can assure the House that there is no responsible officer connected with the Air Staff in the Air Ministry down to Headquarters Command and the groups who is not striving to do the very thing that the House of Commons wants us to do. I welcome the support of the House. I am grateful to my hon. Friend for opening the Debate and I am glad to have had an opportunity of giving some facts which must impress fair-minded men with the efficiency with which the operations of Transport Command are conducted, and I shall always be willing to give the House information.

It being half-past Six o'Clock, Mr. SPEAKER adjourned the House, without Question put, pursuant to the Standing Order.